Irfan’s Corner on the Web On Mac, Linux, Grid, Virtualization and Software Technology

Autonomic Computing making a come back?

Autonomic Computing was a concept popularised by IBM in the early 2000s. Autonomic Computing deals with the creation of a framework for systems that enables them to be "self-aware",self-healing", "self-managing", "self-configuring".

Thats a lot of buzzwords coupled into a single technology. The aim of autonomic computing is definitely very ambitious. Since it has been popularised very few systems have taken up the challenge to create a fully autonomic system. However with the maturing of Grid computing technology and Cloud computing the ideas of Autonomic Computing are finding traction in these domains.

Both Grids and Clouds manage large number of systems, and provide a single system abstraction for its users to use those resources. Grid and Cloud middleware must be "self-aware" through monitoring to detect failing sites and systems and exclude them from resource requests. Self healing in these systems is about migrating virtual machines or workloads to prevent failures of user tasks. Self-managing in the context of Grids and Clouds is about managing the efficient aggregation of resources and ensuring they are used efficiently. Self Configuring finally is about automatic configuration of machines and workloads.

All aspects of autonomic computing are in line with Grid and Cloud computing, and it is no wonder to me that the convergence of these has been discussed recently.