EconoGrid: A detailed Simulation Model of a Standards-based Grid 

Compute Economy 

EconoGrid is a detailed simulation model, implemented in SLX1, of a grid compute 

economy that implements selected standard specifications developed by OASIS and the 

Open Grid Forum. A computing grid is a large-scale collection of distributed computing 

resources that is available for on-demand access by a large numbers of users. In a grid 

compute economy, computing resources are sold to users in a market where price is 

determined by supply and demand. EconoGrid is a tool for investigating global behavior 

of a grid compute economy over time. EconoGrid models operation of many users and 

grid service providers communicating over a network with realistic message delays. 

Users have a set of computing tasks to be executed on the grid together with a budget. 

Grid service providers manage cluster processors, supercomputers, or other computing 

resources for executing user tasks. Providers advertise their services for a price designed 

to cover operating costs. Users discover providers and offer contracts to execute their 

tasks for a fee. EconoGrid tracks the status of user tasks, the state of service providers, 

and the evolution of price over time. 

The operation of EconoGrid can be parameterized by a large number of variables. 

These include network topology and the configuration of users and providers, workload 

characteristics, provider capabilities, and detailed behavior of users and providers. 

Workload characteristics include task duration and processing requirements, inter-task 

workflows. Workload level is defined by the number of tasks assigned to clients. 

Individual tasks are also assigned financial rewards they achieve if completed on time 

and budgets from which to pay providers. Provider cluster sizes can be varied together 

with operating costs. Both clients and providers are assigned target profit margins they 

seek to fulfill. Specific values are chosen from statistical distributions provided as part of 

the parameter definition. Client and provider behaviors are especially important input 

parameters. EconoGrid permits selection of defined behaviors for contract negotiation 

strategy, client selection and prioritization of providers, and provider selection of contract 

offers. The strategies employed by clients and provider determine allocation of resources 

during a simulation. 

Most recently, EconoGrid has been applied to investigate feasibility of using profitbased resource allocation strategies in moderate-sized computing grids in which 

workload is varied from 0 to 200% of total provider capacity [1]. The results 

demonstrated that profit-based strategies worked well at moderate load levels (50-100%) 

in comparison with traditional resource allocation strategies based on utilization 

thresholds. At overload, profit-based strategies are decidedly better at allocating 

resources to the most valuable tasks. The work resulted in the development of a new 

metric, system welfare, which evaluates performance of compute economies by 

considering economic benefits to participants together with larger social welfare derived 

from the operation of a grid. 

[1] Mills, K. and Dabrowski, C. “Can Economics-based Resource Allocation Prove 

Effective in a Computation Marketplace?” submitted for review to the Journal of Grid 

Computing.

 

1

 SLX is a commercial simulation system available from Wolverine Software, see: 

http://www.wolverinesoftware.com.