TGRID: Grid Computing For Computational Problem Solving in a Liberal Arts Environment
From Anita Borg Institute Wiki
By
Contents |
Sarah Monisha Pulimood
Department of Computer Science The College of New Jersey Ewing, NJ 08628 +1-609-771-2788 pulimood@tcnj.edu
Shane Mullin
Department of Computer Science The College of New Jersey Ewing, NJ 08628 +1-908-227-9503 mullin5@tcnj.edu
Stephen Sigwart
146 South Franklin Ave. Berlin, NJ 08009 +1-609-771-2268 sigwart4@tcnj.edu
ABSTRACT
A grid computing environment can harness campus computing resources to solve large computational problems in a variety of domains. In this paper, we discuss the challenges of developing TGRID, a grid computing framework, at a small liberal arts institution, for collaborative problem solving. A prototype of this system successfully helped a mathematics faculty member determine the value of the Jacobstahl function j(n) for all n < 50. Due to the computation intensive nature of the algorithm, previously this value was known only for all n < 21. We present the motivation for designing a more robust environment, the design considerations and challenges, as well as the results obtained by using the enhanced version of TGRID on a sample problem. The goal is to leverage TGRID to collaborate with other faculty to solve computationally intensive problem in domains as diverse as biology, psychology, and English.
