The influence of microprocessors on computer architecture: Distributed processing

It has recently become both technologically and economically feasible to produce a complete, general purpose, stored program process or on a small number of LSI circuits. This development has already begun to influence computer system architecture in the direction of distributed processing—the construction of a larger machine from a multiplicity of smaller ones. Critical issues in this effort appear to be process partitioning and assignment, interprocess communication, and processor interconnection. In a distributed computer, processors may function as: special purpose components (e.g., decimal processing unit) in a larger processor; dedicated support (e.g., I/O) processors; or multiple main (i.e., “central”) processors.