Grid Computing Concept

Hello, everyone.
I've been thinking of a concept in Computercraft that already exists in the real world:

I believe that all computers in CC in a world are running on the same level, when one computer stops, the next computer is processed, and so on (which is why you get the too long without yielding error), so this wouldn't really work. I might be wrong though, I'm not sure.

What would be usage for that?

• I would imagine some autocrafting tasks, like if you didn't have Applied Energistics (that would be sad)
• Maybe some distributed resource loan system in multiplayer
• everyone sets up a computer, some inventory access system
• you request resources - other player's systems would provide those e.g. through ender chests

It would be interesting to setup effective remote communication over the distance. I did this with floppy/turtle/ender chest - it worked ok. Scalable? Not sure.

Symmetryc, on 22 September 2013 - 07:09 PM said:

I believe that all computers in CC in a world are running on the same level, when one computer stops, the next computer is processed, and so on (which is why you get the too long without yielding error), so this wouldn't really work. I might be wrong though, I'm not sure.

os.queueEvent("")  coroutine.yield()

I use this on very long loop processes to stop "too long without yielding" errors. XD
I learned this code when I used to ask help very frequently in the Ask A Pro section.

MCuniverse, on 22 September 2013 - 07:16 PM said:

Symmetryc, on 22 September 2013 - 07:09 PM said:

I believe that all computers in CC in a world are running on the same level, when one computer stops, the next computer is processed, and so on (which is why you get the too long without yielding error), so this wouldn't really work. I might be wrong though, I'm not sure.

os.queueEvent("")  coroutine.yield()

I use this on very long loop processes to stop "too long without yielding" errors. XD
I learned this code when I used to ask help very frequently in the Ask A Pro section.

I know, but it still wouldn't increase the efficiency if what I saw was true, because that would slow down the other computers.

This wouldn't do anything useful since only one computer runs at a time anyway. A system like this would likely be a net loss over simply performing the computation on one computer.

Well, if it's like that, then scratch this concept. After all, it's just a method of possible multitasking. Besides, there are very few operating systems that I know has neat multi-tasking option Ehh, true. The fact that there's Parallel API already makes me sort of stupid not thinking this through. Thanks for reminding me, anyway.

Well, even so. The way it's implemented, each task is only calculated in sequence with our computers. There's nothing that you can di with grid/cloud computing that wouldn't be better handled with one computer.

If the storage is limited, then you can make a grid storage thing.

While this doesn't improve performance, this could be used for a lot of other stuff like opening/closing doors far away from your main computer or firing many TNT cannons that are controlled by just one computer or syncing passwords between computers.

KingOfNoobs, on 25 September 2013 - 04:08 PM said:

While this doesn't improve performance, this could be used for a lot of other stuff like opening/closing doors far away from your main computer or firing many TNT cannons that are controlled by just one computer or syncing passwords between computers.

This is more networking than grid computing (poster asks about grid computing), but I'm with you - I see main power in easy remote communication of computers.

What would make performance benefit is creating a grid of non-CC machines controlled by CC computers - those machines can run in parallel.
For some setups you could even program a turtle to build individual nodes of the grid. That turtle could even craft individual machines from raw materials.

Again.
All computers in the entire world/server on ComputerCraft only run each task ONE AT A TIME. None of them can run simultaneously/in parallel.
Grid/cloud computing is no faster/more efficient in CC than it would be to simply assign the entire task to one computer.