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Computer Architecture and VLSI Systems Division Operating Systems and HPCN

Network Memory

This project deals with exploting the idle main memory of all workstations in a LAN. Such uses of that available main memory include, remote memory paging, network RAM disk, (remote) main memory database systems, etc. Fast interconnection networks enable fast memory-to-memory transfers, thus making paging to remote memory more promising than paging to disk.

Members

Staff :

  • Evangelos Markatos, Assistant Professor of Computer Science
  • Manolis Katevenis, Professor of Computer Science, Head of AVG

    • Graduate Students:

  • George Dramitinos
  • Michael Flouris
  • Sotiris Ioannidis
  • Thanos Papathanasiou

    • Undergraduate Students:

  • Julia Sevaslidou (alumnae)

    • Relevant Publications:

  • Michail D. Flouris, and Evangelos P. Markatos: Network RAM. In High Performance Cluster Computing, pp. 383-408, editor Buyya Rajkumar, Prentice Hall, USA, 1999.
  • George Dramitinos and Evangelos P. Markatos: Adaptive and Reliable Paging to Remote Main Memory. Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing, pages 357-388, 58(3), September 1999, Academic Press.
  • Sotiris Ioannidis, Athanasios E. Papathanasiou, Gregory Maglis, Dioanisis Pnevmatikatos and Evangelos P. Markatos, Julia Sevaslidou: On Using Reliable Network RAM in Networks of Workstations: Parallel and Distributed Computing Practices, Special Issue on High Performance Computing on Clusters Nova Science Publishers, USA, accepted for publication.
  • Dionisios Pnevmatikatos, Evangelos P. Markatos, Gregory Maglis, and Sotiris Ioannidis: On Using Network RAM as a non-volatile Buffer, Cluster Computing: The Journal on Networks, Software, and Applications, 2(4), pp. 295-303, 1999, Baltzer Science Publishers.
  • Michail Flouris and Evangelos P. Markatos: The Network RamDisk: using remote memory on heterogeneous NOWs. Cluster Computing: The Journal on Networks, Software, and Applications, 2(4), pp. 281-293, 1999, Baltzer Science Publishers.
  • Dionisios Pnevmatikatos, Evangelos P. Markatos, Gregory Maglis, and Sotiris Ioannidis: On Using Network RAM as a non-volatile Buffer Technical Report 227, ICS-FORTH, Aug. 1998. Available: compressed postscript (76 KBytes).
  • Michail D. Flouris and Evangelos P. Markatos : "The Network RamDisk : Using Remote Memory on Heterogeneous NOWs" , Technical Report 226, ICS-FORTH, Aug. 1998. Available: compressed postscript (54 KBytes).
  • Sotiris Ioanidis, Evangelos Markatos , and Julia Sevaslidou: On Using Network Memory to Improve the Performance of Transaction Based Systems. In Proceedings of 1998 International Conference on Parallel and Distributed Processing Techniques and Applications (PDPTA'98), July 1998, Las Vegas, USA. Available: compressed PostScript (101 kB).
  • Athanasios E. Papathanassiou and Evangelos P. Markatos: Lightweight Transactions on Networks of Workstations. In International Conference on Distributed Computing Systems (ICDCS 1998), Amsterdam, May 1998. Available: compressed PostScript (80 kB).
  • A. E. Papathanassiou E. P. Markatos: On using Reliable Network RAM for Database Systems poster paper at the 16th Symposium on Operating System Principles (SOSP) , Oct 1997. Available: compressed postscript (16 KBytes).
  • A. E. Papathanassiou E. P. Markatos: Lightweight Transactions on Networks of Workstations Technical Report 209, ICS-FORTH, Sept 1997. Available: compressed postscript (100 KBytes).
  • E. P. Markatos: Visualizing Working Sets Technical Report No. 192, May 1996, ICS-FORTH, Heraklion, Crete, Greece. Appeared in Operating Systems Review 31(4), pp. 3-11, 1997. Available: compressed postscript (1210 KBytes).
  • S. Ioanidis, E. P. Markatos, and J. Sevaslidou: On using Network Memory to Improve the Performance of Transaction-Based Systems Technical Report No. 190, March 1996, ICS-FORTH, Heraklion, Crete, Greece. Available: compressed postscript (60 KBytes).
  • Evangelos P. Markatos: Issues in Reliable Network Memory Paging . In Proceedings of MASCOTS'96 (Int. Workshop on Modeling, Analysis and Simulation of Computer and Telecommunications Systems), San Jose, CA, USA, Feb. 1996. Available compressed postscript (83 KB).
  • Evangelos P. Markatos: Using Remote Memory to avoid Disk Thrashing: A Simulation Study. In Proceedings of MASCOTS'96 (Int. Workshop on Modeling, Analysis and Simulation of Computer and Telecommunications Systems), San Jose, CA, USA, Feb. 1996. Available compressed postscript (52 KB).
  • Evangelos P. Markatos , George Dramitinos : Implementation of a Reliable Remote Memory Pager. In USENIX 1996 Technical Conference, San Diego, Ca, January 22-26, 1996. Available compressed postscript (125 KB).
  • Evangelos P. Markatos , George Dramitinos: Adding Flexibility to a Remote Memory Pager. In Fourth International Workshop on Object Orientation in Operating Systems, IWOOOS 96, pages 183-186, Lund, Sweden, August 1995.Available: compressed postscript (38kB).
  • Evangelos P. Markatos, George Dramitinos, Kosmas Papachristos : Implementation and Evaluation of a Remote Memory Pager . Technical Report 129,ICS-FORTH, Crete, Greece ,March 1995. Available: compressed PostScript (82kB).

    • Tools:

    A. Alexandrakis, Free memory hunting and visualization in distributed systems: Xstat (senior thesis), 1995.

  • Remote Memory Pager Sources for DEC OSF/1

  • Network RamDisk Sources for Digital Unix 4.0 and Linux 2.0.x