The Grid 2 Blueprint for a New Computing Infrastructure The Elsevier Series in Grid Computing
May 17, 2009 by Joint Venture Marketing
The Grid 2 Blueprint for a New Computing Infrastructure The Elsevier Series in Grid Computing
The Grid is an emerging infrastructure that will fundamentally change the way we think about-and use-computing. The word Grid is used by analogy with the electric power grid, which provides pervasive access to electricity and has had a dramatic impact on human capabilities and society. Many believe that by allowing all components of our information technology infrastructure-computational capabilities, databases, sensors, and people-to be shared flexibly as true collaborative tools the Grid will have a similar transforming effect, allowing new classes of applications to emerge.
-From the Preface
In 1998, Ian Foster and Carl Kesselman introduced a whole new concept in computing with the first edition of this book. Today there is a broader and deeper understanding of the nature of the opportunities offered by Grid computing and the technologies needed to realize those opportunities. In Grid 2, the editors reveal the revolutionary impact of large-scale resource sharing and virtualization within science and industry, the intimate relationships between organization and resource sharing structures and the new technologies required to enable secure, reliable, and efficient resource sharing on large scale.
Foster and Kesselman have once again assembled a team of experts to present an up-to-date view of Grids that reports on real experiences and explains the available technologies and new technologies emerging from labs, companies and standards bodies. Grid 2, like its predecessor, serves as a manifesto, design blueprint, user guide and research agenda for future Grid systems.
*30 chapters including more than a dozen completely new chapters.
*Web access to 13 unchanged chapters from the first edition.
*Three personal essays by influential thinkers on the significance of Grids from the perspectives of infrastructure, industry, and science.
*A foundational overview of the central Grid concepts and architectural principles.
*Twelve application vignettes showcase working Grids in science, engineering, industry, and commerce.
*Detailed discussions of core architecture and services, data and knowledge management, and higher-level tools.
*Focused presentations on production Grid deployment, computing platforms, peer-to-peer technologies, and network infrastructures.
*Extensive bibliography and glossary.
User Ratings and Reviews
5 Stars Startling look into the future
I don’t understand some of the critical reviews of this book. The fact is that Grids do exist today and are being used by Research oriented companies. About two dozen companies are already serving clients in the realm of grid computing. Platform Computing, United Devices, and Avaki are just three companies who are helping to create the future of the grid computing. The web succeded because it connected everybody. Until larger grids are contructed for business enterprises I agree that grid computing will not grow. The book does a great job of showing what the future may be like in terms of grid computing. Someday your computing resources will come from your local Grid Computing Company just as you get electricity from your Power Company. How that comes to be is still the ultimate question.
1 Star Nothing but an Overview of Where Grids Are in 2003 and Where Could They Go
I am intensely interested in the current state of Grid technology (Dec. 2005) and want to begin an implementation or the participation of a modern Grid. I got the book yesterday and am now done with it. This book should never have had a second edition. I skimmed through all 748 pages in about one hour. It is repeat of topic after topic by different authors rehashing the same ‘issues’ that anyone who found this book has probably already learned as much in his Googling.
This is frustrating, WHERE IS THE MEAT!!!! in Grid technology. No one seems to have a decent book. Its almost 2006! Someone, teach me how to build a Grid and run Hello World on it please!
4 Stars Hear the authors out
Boy, when was VA declared an imagination-free zone? Don’t the critical reviewers of this book have any belief in the possibilities afforded by grid computing? To complain that the book is light on technical detail is somewhat churlish, because the purpose of the book was to examine the possibilities, not show you how to code one up in an afternoon at the comfort of your desk.
Can there be any doubt that computing grids will start to become popular in some form or another? I don’t think there is any doubt at all. Perhaps when some of the research and early work is complete and the standards agreed, some enterprising author can write a book on grid computing with more technical meat on the bone, but until that work is done, what would be the point? I suspect there just isn’t all that much technical detail to point at yet.
To my way of thinking, all the possible uses and configurations of computing grids are still to be discovered. If you are one of the explorers intent on doing something new and different with the technology, then this book is for you. If you are only content to follow the crowd, once all the technical details have been worked out and served up on a plate to you by somebody else, then by all means skip this book and wait for one with more technical gravitas.
4 Stars Excellent Book into the future
This is a great buy and an excellent book into the future. Very well explained collection of topics.
2 Stars Poor tech, poor future insights
Before buying this book, I also bought the first volume. Personally I would say the first one being more interesting and technically adequate to whom wants a professional insight on what grid computing is. The second book seemed to me a simple marketing strategy: no new topics, no technical insights. Just an annoying list of accomplished grid deployments ranging from scientific installments to commercial ones.
I’m actually disappointed. I was hoping Foster et. al. could give me some new and interesting insights on what are the real problems of advanced grid computing concepts and techniques instead, I received a book great only for making the references to my thesis (I was doing my master thesis on grid mapping algorithms).
Moreover, most of the deployed scenarios explained in the book can be easily find on the net by searching for scientific documents on specific grid topics. Seems more of a collage of articles rather than a deep analysis of actual grid challenges, techniques and pros&cons.
I would suggest such a book only to newby wanting to get an overview of what grid computing is and what has been done to date.
