Sun™ Cluster 3 Programming: Integrating Applications into the SunPlex™ Environment

Chapter 1. Introduction

Automobiles were predominately purchased by automobile enthusiasts when they first appeared on the market approximately a hundred years ago. These early models lacked many of the practical features we take for granted today, such as safety, automation, a roof to keep out the rain, and reliability. It wasn’t until the automobile became a reliable mode of transportation that society began replacing the horse.

A similar scenario occurred in the computing industry. In the past two decades huge advances have been made in the reliability of information technology: application specific integrated circuits (ASIC), redundant arrays of independent disks (RAID), hot swapping, hot sparing, fault-tolerant computing, redundant components, ...