Experiences with a portable network operating system

Abstract

DACNOS (Distributed Academic Computing Network Operating System) is a prototype network operating system that facilitates cooperation in heterogeneous multi-vendor computing environments, It is an add-on software system that does not replace nor interfere with the existing host operating system, but enables resource sharing with integrated access control and resource management across the network of heterogeneous computers. We describe the DACNOS design goals and the resulting architecture. Our main focus is on our experiences, with the development and use of the prototype. In particular we comment on the portability of the system and the experience with newly written applications. It has been shown that DACNOS is a powerful and convenient application enabling platform for distributed computing in heterogeneous environments.