Ka Clustering Tools
A second version of Kadeploy will soon be available for download, please stay tuned
and have a look at the current alpha version documentation.
Please note that a turn-key cluster environment based on the Ka-tools is available at http://clic.mandrakesoft.com.
Overview
Ka is a a set of open source tools designed to help the installation
and the use of a cluster of PC's under Linux or Windows.
It includes a scalable solution for cloning nodes (ka-deploy)
and a process management library (ka-run).
Ka will also provides a scalable
NFS-compliant file systems (nfsp) and system monitoring tools (ka-admin).
Scalability
Ka uses several algorithms - reliable multicast, binomial/binary/lambda
trees, pipeline chains, etc - to copy files and launch processes on a cluster.
Ka is then efficient in a variety of situations, switched and non switched
networks, wide-area networks, and a big range of file sizes, regardless
of the number of computers involved.
It has been tested successfully on a 225-node cluster.
Ka-boot is an automatic PXE-compliant boot mechanism. It was designed as
an open source replacement to BpBatch
but it has fewer features.
Ka-deploy is an OS installer which provides a cloning system and a post-installation
tool.
It has been tested to deploy Linux and Windows computers including
dual boot computers.
Since it uses "tar" or "dd" to copy a file system, it might be used
for any other operating system.
A brief explanation of ka-deploy.
Ka-run is a process management library. It also provides parallel commands
(file copy, reboot, monitoring, etc) for use in a cluster.
A brief explanation of ka-run.
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Like most cloning software, Ka-deploy is designed for homogeneous hardware
and software. Yet the post-installation phase should allow special customization.
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Ka-boot needs a PXE-compliant computer.
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Ka-boot and Ka-deploy need a dhcpd/tftpd/nfs server.
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Ka-run needs "cygwin" and a "rshd daemon" on Windows (the "cygwin"
rshd has been tested successfully)
Downloading [Top]
Ka binaries
You can grab the ka-deploy and the ka-run binaries on the project
page on Sourceforge.
And then follow the installation notes for ka-deploy.
Ka sources
You can download a tar.gz of ka-deploy on sourceforge (project page/files) or use cvs :
$ cvs -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.ka-tools.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/ka-tools
login (enter empty password)
$ cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.ka-tools.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/ka-tools
co -P ka-deploy
$ cvs -z3 -d:pserver:anonymous@cvs.ka-tools.sourceforge.net:/cvsroot/ka-tools
co -P ka-run
Publications [Top]
Parallel
launcher for clusters of PCs, Cyrille Martin and Olivier Richard,
Parco 2001
A scalable file distribution and operating system installation toolkit for
clusters, Philippe Augerat, Wilfrid Billot, Simon Derr and Cyrille Martin,
submitted to CCgrid 2002
Outils
d'exploitation de grappes de PC, Philippe Augerat, Simon Derr, Stéphane
Martin, Céline Robert, JRES2001 (in french)
nfsp:
A Distributed NFS Server for Clusters of Workstations, P. Lombard, Y.
denneulin, submitted to ipdps 2002
Scalable
monitoring and configuration tools for grids and clusters, P. Augerat, C.
Martin, B. Stein, 10th Euromicro Workshop on Parallel,
Distributed and Network-Based Processing, 2002
Please report any bug here.
Apart from its own bugs, Ka-deploy may fail because the "tar" and "tftp"
commands on several linux distributions have bugs.
See installation.txt and check you have the right version of these
programs.
This project is done within the INRIA research institute and the ID laboratory.
Funds [Top]
The Ka project is partially funded by Bull and Microsoft. The french goverment funds the Ka project in 2002 and
2003 (RNTL project CLIC).
For further information : Philippe.Augerat@imag.fr
This project is hosted by : 