Evaluating applications performance in a multi-networked cluster

Traditionally, a cluster is defined as a collection of homogeneous nodes interconnected by a single high performance communication technology. However, in some cases, cluster nodes may be organized into several partitions – subclusters – internally interconnected by one or more selected SAN technologies. In order to constitute a multi-networked cluster, sub-clusters must share a common SAN technology or a bridge facility must be used. In this paper we show how RoCL – a lightweight user-level communication library designed to support multi-threading in a multi-networked environment – manages to exploit such cluster organization. Performance evaluation results obtained by using two partitions of Myrinet and Gigabit SMP nodes demonstrate the usefulness of our approach both for low-level and high-level operation