Big Data For Dummies

Chapter 3

Old Meets New: Distributed Computing

In This Chapter

Taking a look at distributed computing through the years

Exploring the elements of distributed computing

Putting distributed computing together with hardware and software advancements

Distributed computing is not a new technology concept. It has been around for almost 50 years. Initially, the technology was used in computer science research as a way to scale computing tasks and attack complex problems without the expense of massive computing systems. One of the most successful early endeavors into distributed computing was a project funded by the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA). The result of the organization’s research was the development of the Internet, the first distributed computing network. You might say that it initiated a revolution that has led to a transformation of everything from commerce to healthcare, to transportation, and to human-to-human and machine-to-machine communications. In this chapter, we explain what distributed computing is and describe why it is the foundation for big data.

A Brief History of Distributed Computing

Behind all the most important trends over the past decade, ...