Grid computing may someday eclipse the Web in importance, according to
Sara Murphy, product marketing manager for HP's high performance
technical computing group.
"In five to 10 years, Grid computing could become more significant than
the Web is today," said Murphy, who spoke at the second Grid Computing
Planet Conference & Expo in Boston earlier this week. "The Grid will do
for resources what the Web did for information."
But Grid technology has a long way to go to realize that promise, she
said.
"Grid today is the equivalent of ARPANET in the 1980s," Murphy said.
"Very few applications have been enabled to take full advantage of the
Grid," and security remains an issue.
The biggest risk factor for Grid is "over hype," Murphy said. But if
users become disillusioned with Grid computing, the same concepts -
utilizing geographically diverse resources, adapting to peaks and
troughs in demand, and sharing expensive or specialized resources -
would likely reappear under another name and still advance over the next
5-10 years, she said.
Vendor-neutral open standards are critical to Grid's success, Murphy
said. The recent Global Grid Forum meeting got past a lot of the hype
surrounding Grid and got "a lot of work done," she said.
The Globus Toolkit 2.2 has been HP qualified and updated, and can be
found at hp.com/products/globus, Murphy said. Other HP products that are
compatible with Grid computing include Utility Data Center, which Murphy
likened to a "power station on the Grid," and OpenView Suite for Web
services management.
Murphy also reported that, much to her surprise, iPAQ mobile devices
have proven to be "really useful" and "very handy" in the European
GridLab project. "Mobile computing devices are going to be very much a
part of the Grid," she said.
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