Performance evaluation of fault tolerance for parallel applications in networked environments

Abstract

This paper presents the performance evaluation of a software fault manager for distributed applications. Dubbed STAR, it uses the natural redundancy existing in networks of workstations to offer a high level of fault tolerance. Fault management is transparent to the supported parallel applications. STAR is application independent, highly configurable and easily portable to UNIX-like operating systems. The current implementation is based on independent checkpointing and message logging. Measurements show the efficiency and the limits of this implementation. The challenge is to show that a software approach to fault tolerance can efficiently be implemented in a standard networked environment.