If one hardware platform goes down, the system itself will restart the problem on a new server, without the user becoming involved. Parallel processing can be achieved on the server side by invoking a solver that can run on a parallel computer. For example, if the request to NetSolve is for a the solution to a system of linear equations, NetSolve may choose to solve the problem on a parallel computer without the user being aware or involved in parallel programming. In the user's program, NetSolve can be invoked through blocking or nonblocking calls, thus enabling another level of parallel processing. The system can be enhanced and grow in a number of ways.
Users can add computational servers and software components dynamically to the system.
They are intended to further our research interests and, almost as a by product, produce software that computational scientists may find useful. NetSolve was developed in the same spirit. We want to gain insight into heterogeneous distributed computing and allow our colleagues to use the system and comment on the approach and techniques used to solve problems in this fashion. We will also port the system to NT and Window based platforms and enable a much greater range of software components. After this initial beta release of NetSolve, we plan to release a Version 1.0, where we will take into account the feedback from users of this version.