Design and implementation of a network-wide concurrent file system in a workstation cluster

We estimate the performance of a network-wide concurrent file system implemented using conventional disks as disk arrays. Tests were carried out on both single system and network-wide environments. On single systems, a file was split across several disks to test the performance of file I/O operations. We concluded that performance was proportional to the number of disks, up to four, on a system with high computing power. Performance of a system with low computing power, however, did not increase, even with more than two disks. When we split a file across disks in a network-wide system called the Network-wide Concurrent File System (N-CFS), we found performance similar to or slightly higher than that of disk arrays on single systems. Since file access through N-CFS is transparent, this system enables traditional disks on single and networked systems to be used as disk arrays for I/O intensive jobs.