[Beowulf] Is Beowulf the right solution for my problem ?

[Nicolas GUIOT]

Hello everybody.

I was just looking for a cluster management solution, and found out that Beowulf could be a good solution.
I then started reading this : http://www.phy.duke.edu/~rgb/Beowulf/beowulf_book/beowulf_book/index.html

And I'm now wondering if my applications were right designed to run on the beowulf cluster.

>From what I read so far, it seems beowulf is adapted to make ONE calculation on several nodes, but this is not my objective : 
-I have a COW of about 20 to 40 computers, mostly differents, in terms of CPU, RAM, and so on
- We run several applications (Theoritical Bio-chemistry), not especially designed for parallel processing

My goal is to have a master node to which everyone supplies his jobs, then the master dispatches the jobs to the different computers, according to criterias (CPU must be Intel, CPU must be over 2 GHz, need much RAM, etc....)

So the question is : is beowulf adapted to my needs, and if it's not, do you know any available (free) solution for me ? (I've already heard about Sun Grid Engine, but for "political" reasons....)

Thanks for your help

Nicolas GUIOT
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