File Access Performance of Diskless Workstations

File Access Performance of Diskless Workstations (1986)

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by Edward D. Lazowska , John Zahorjan , David R. Cheriton , Willy Zwaenepoel

Venue:	ACM Transactions on Computer Systems
Citations:	51 - 1 self

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Datum	Value	Source
TITLE	File Access Performance of Diskless Workstations	INFERENCE
AUTHOR NAME	Edward D. Lazowska	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR AFFIL	University of Washington	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR NAME	John Zahorjan	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR AFFIL	University of Washington	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR NAME	David R. Cheriton	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR AFFIL	Stanford University; and	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR NAME	Willy Zwaenepoel	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
AUTHOR AFFIL	Rice University	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
ABSTRACT	This paper studies the performance of single-user workstations that access files remotely over a local area network. From the environmental, economic, and administrative points of view, workstations that are diskless or that have limited secondary storage are desirable at the present time. Even with changing technology, access to shared data will continue to be important. It is likely that some performance penalty must be paid for remote rather than local file access. Our objectives are to assess this penalty and to explore a number of design alternatives that can serve to minimize it. Our approach is to use the results of measurement experiments to parameterize queuing network performance models. These models then are used to assess performance under load and to evahrate design alternatives. The major conclusions of our study are: (1) A system of diskless workstations with a shared file server can have satisfactory performance. By this, we mean performance comparable to that of a local disk in the lightly loaded case, and the ability to support substantial numbers of client workstations without significant degradation. As with any shared facility, good design is necessary to minimize queuing delays under high load. (2) The key to efficiency is protocols that allow volume transfers at every interface (e.g., between client and server, and between disk and memory at the server) and at every level (e.g., between client and server at the level of logical	SVM HeaderParse 0.2
YEAR	1986	INFERENCE
VENUE	ACM Transactions on Computer Systems	INFERENCE
VENUE TYPE	JOURNAL	INFERENCE
PAGES	238--268	INFERENCE
VOLUME	4	INFERENCE
CITATIONS	13 found	ParsCit 1.0