The dictionary definition of the prefix meta- is: "Beyond; More
comprehensive; More highly developed." So a meta-computer goes beyond
the boundaries of a traditional computer as we are accustomed to thinking
of it. Essentially, a
metacomputer is a collection of many individual
computers, connected by a network (the Internet for example), which can
cooperate on solving a problem. In general, this allows the problem to
be solved much more quickly than would be possible using a single computer.
Supercomputers are much faster than a single desktop computer too, but they
usually cost millions of dollars, and everyone has to compete for time to
work on their problem. Recently, personal computers
have become very fast and relatively inexpensive. At the same
time, the idea of free software (like the
Linux operating system) has started to catch on. These developments have
made it feasible to build a
specialized metacomputer with as much computing power as a 5 year old
supercomputer, but for only about 1% of the cost!
The problem that I am working on will require that I run literally millions
of computer models of pulsating white dwarf stars over the several-year
duration of my research project. To make these calculations practical, I
have configured a metacomputer using 32 Intel Pentium-II systems running
under a customized version of the Linux operating system.
Thanks to another piece of free software called
PVM (for Parallel Virtual Machine),
I can use one fully-equipped personal computer to control the entire system.
This central computer is responsible for distributing work to each of the
32 processors, and collecting the results. There is a small amount of work
required just to keep track of everything, so the metacomputer actually
runs as fast as 30 (rather than 32) single Pentium-II systems. Not bad!
