From: Alec Cawley Newsgroups: comp.parallel Subject: Re: Looking for on-line Primer Date: 25 Aug 1998 20:55:50 GMT Organization: Approved: bigrigg@cs.cmu.edu Message-Id: <6rv8cm$sj5$1@encore.ece.cmu.edu> Originator: bigrigg@ece.cmu.edu In article <6rkfas$q35$1@encore.ece.cmu.edu>, Sean Lorber writes >Are distributed and/or parallel computing the same? A >beginners guide... No. There is significant overlap, but the fields are separate. The general trend of parallel computing is the search for high performance - higher than can be achieved by any single processor. Distributed computing, as I understand it, is placing compute power physically close to where it is needed. The two threads (sic) share a common theme that they deal, in a way not common in other fields of computing, with the division of a problem into multiple simultaneous computing threads, with the problems (and benefits) that this brings. There is sufficient enough overlap that the two groups talk the same language, and sufficient disparity that they can get thoroughly irritated with each other. This ng is (so far as I can see) mostly concerned with high performance computing. I am not aware of any ng explicitly dealing with distributed computing. The nearest would be comp.sys.transputer, now sadly expiring alongside its eponymous processor. -- Alec Cawley - who is of the distributed sect -- Articles to bigrigg+parallel@cs.cmu.edu (Admin: bigrigg@cs.cmu.edu) Archive: http://www.hensa.ac.uk/parallel/internet/usenet/comp.parallel