What are the differences between grid computing, utility computing and virtualization?
Monday, November 30th, 2009 at
8:28 pm
Are they just different names for the same concept?
Tagged with: concept
Filed under: Tech News
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They are different views and uses of a concept rather than the same exact thing.
Grid Computing tends to refer (in academic circles) to the science, protocols and technologies that enable massively distributed computer systems to be assembled across many origanisations. Due to the massive scale of these systems they are often homogeneous (i.e. many different kinds of large computers and protocols that find some common ground through the grid protocols).
Utility Computing (among commercial circles) is most commonly used to describe the ability to purchase computing power when it is needed, as a result utility computing tends to be more heterogeneous since it is often supplied by a single vendor.
Virtualization is the odd-man-out here as it’s a concept that appears in both grid computing and utility computing models, as well as on smaller machines and describes the capability for a single hardware machine to appear to run as multiple machines through software. So it’s popular in Utility computing because it’s a nice way of selling "a machine" that doesn’t really exist – i.e. the company sells the capability of a machine but owns an entirely different kind of machine altogether.