Application and middleware transparent checkpointing with TCKPT on ClusterGrids

This paper introduces a combination of the existing parallel checkpointing techniques for software heterogeneous ClusterGrid infrastructures. Most of the existing solutions are aiming at supporting application transparency (no checkpoint-related code development in application), but some others build middleware transparent (no service modification) solutions. The main contribution of this paper is to introduce a solution providing both application and middleware transparency at the same time. Compatibility and integrity requirements are identified and corresponding conditions are established using Abstract State Machines. The most relevant checkpointing systems are checked against the conditions in order to examine their conformity. Based on the conditions, a novel checkpointing method is defined and a proof of concept checkpointing tool, called TotalCheckpoint (TCKPT) is introduced