More on Distributed Computing（分布式计算定义详解）
转自 GIMPS 官方论坛：http://www.mersenneforum.org/showthread.php?s=&postid=15154#post15154
More on Distributed Computing
The combined processing power of all the computers in the world is astonishing. The vast majority of these computers never utilize anything but a small fraction of their computational power. The rest of the processing power remains unused and under ordinary circumstances goes to waste as so-called idle cycles.
Surfing the Web, checking e-mail, using Word and Excel does not exert much pressure on a modern processor that can operate at many hundreds of million instructions per second. Most of the time, the processor sits idle, waiting for something to do. It doesn't actually do anything, but performs a special operation that - well does nothing. This cycle is called an idle cycle.
There are a number of individuals or groups in the fields of science, mathematics, cryptography, and other fields who require massive amounts of computing power in order to solve certain problems. In many instances, the cost of the high-end computers that would be required in order to solve these problems is far too high for these researchers, or for very rich companies or even governments. There are instances where the total required computing power to solve a problem is so high that it is not realistically obtainable at all. Many of these problems have important implications for fields such as medicine, mathematics and other scientific areas of exploration and could benefit humanity in general if solved.
This is where Distributed Computing comes into the picture. Using the unused computing power of a large number of computers some of these problems can actually be solved within a reasonable amount of time. Distributed Computing (DC) is a branch of Computer Science that deal with ways one can solve these large computational problems. Large computing tasks are first broken into much smaller tasks (often called Work Units or WUs), which are then sent over the Internet to lots of smaller computers for processing. These smaller work units are then processed utilizing only the unused computing cycles or idle cycles.
When a computation unit is completely processed, the result is then uploaded to a central server which has the responsibility of storing the results and do any post-processing if necessary.
The computational units are designed so that the amount of data that needs to be downloaded and uploaded is kept small in order to avoid overburdening the user's Internet capabilities.
The central server sorts and arranges the data received in such a way that the processed data points combine in order to effectively function as if all the entire problem was processed in one extremely powerful computer.
The whole process turns an individual's computer effectively into a small part of a giant supercomputer whose different parts are connected through the Internet. This technique allows researchers inexpensive access to massive computing power that would not otherwise be obtainable.
By running one of these distributed computing projects, you can play an important role in solving one of these computational problems. 中文翻译如下：（如有错误，敬请指正，谢谢！）
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如果将全世界所有的计算机联合起来，那么得到的处理能力将大得惊人！几乎所有的计算机都只是利用了它们的处理能力的极小的一部分。绝大部分的处理能力都被白白的浪费在了电脑空转的时候或者是运行些无关紧要的程序上了。
上网冲浪、收发 E-mail、使用 Word 和 Excel 等办公软件并不能对现代的这些每秒能处理上亿次指令的处理器产生什么压力。所以在多数时间里，处理器都只是闲坐着，或者在等什么事情做做。虽然计算机开着，但那实际上不做什么，而是运行一个很特殊的进程，这个进程就叫做“无所事事进程”。
有许多在数学、密码学或其他科学研究领域的个人或团体在解决问题的过程中都需要惊人的计算量。对于研究人员来说，没有比直接使用超大型计算机更为快速便捷的了，但是恐怕只用政府部门或是非常富有的公司才有使用高档计算机的财力。如果医学、数学、密码学等等上的一些问题能够被解决，这无疑会造益于人类。
在这种情况下，分布式计算技术应运而生。它能够调用大量的计算机进行协同处理某些特定的问题，籍以使得这些问题能够在一个让人接受的时间内被解决。分布式计算是一门用来处理需要大型计算量的问题的计算机学科。一个大型的计算任务首先被分解为许多的小任务包（通常将它们称做工作单元，简记为 WU），然后将这些小任务包通过互联网分发给世界各地的计算机进行处理。处理过程不会影响到使用者正常的工作，因为处理程序仅仅只使用计算机的闲置处理能力。
当一个工作单元被处理完毕之后，其计算处理后的结果将被上传到一台特定的负责存储的网络中心服务器上，然后再由服务端程序进行后续处理，以便筛选出真正对研究有用的结果。
科学家们在设计工作单元时，为了避免参与者的网络负载过大，将尽可能的保持工作单元在一个较小的数量级。
中心服务器负责分发工作单元和回收计算结果。
整个过程将把任何一台参与到计算中来的计算机变为一台极大型处理机的一个节点。这种技术允许研究人员获得廉价但却巨大的计算能力。
参加分布式计算吧，您必将推动整个人类文明的发展！！！
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翻译人：碧城仙 中国分布式计算总站版权所有 请问管理员，我可以转载么？ 可以转载，但请注明转自：中国分布式计算总站，出处：GIMPS，翻译：碧城仙。 碧城仙在 2005-6-8 07:55 发表:
可以转载，但请注明转自：中国分布式计算总站，出处：GIMPS，翻译：碧城仙。
嗯！！谢谢了，管理员！
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