1.5) Computer Cluster Architecture (cont'd)

The main components are:

• The user interface: Typically consists of a front end or login node. Most of the user interaction take place on this level. It would include the programming and application environment.
• Cluster middleware: Software and hardware to allow the cluster to behave as a single seamless system. Would typically include availability infrastructure and resource sharing software.
• Compute nodes: Typically off the shelf servers with multiple processors in each server. These form the workhorses of the cluster. Typically a single operating system (OS) software image is installed on all the compute nodes.
• High speed network: This connects the compute nodes and allows high speed, low latency communications between the nodes.
• File Storage: This can consist of high speed parallel file systems, to allow for high speed I/O operations to aid the computation. It would also contain less volatile storage for source code and reference data.