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arXiv · 1701.04907

OpenCluster: A Flexible Distributed Computing Framework for Astronomical Data Processing

Shoulin Wei·Feng Wang·Hui Deng·Cuiyin Liu·Wei Dai·Bo Liang·Ying Mei·Congming Shi·Yingbo Liu·Jingping Wu
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Abstract

The volume of data generated by modern astronomical telescopes is extremely large and rapidly growing. However, current high-performance data processing architectures/frameworks are not well suited for astronomers because of their limitations and programming difficulties. In this paper, we therefore present OpenCluster, an open-source distributed computing framework to support rapidly developing high-performance processing pipelines of astronomical big data. We first detail the OpenCluster design principles and implementations and present the APIs facilitated by the framework. We then demonstrate a case in which OpenCluster is used to resolve complex data processing problems for developing a pipeline for the Mingantu Ultrawide Spectral Radioheliograph. Finally, we present our OpenCluster performance evaluation. Overall, OpenCluster provides not only high fault tolerance and simple programming interfaces, but also a flexible means of scaling up the number of interacting entities. OpenCluster thereby provides an easily integrated distributed computing framework for quickly developing a high-performance data processing system of astronomical telescopes and for significantly reducing software development expenses.

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Shoulin Wei, Feng Wang, Hui Deng, Cuiyin Liu, Wei Dai, Bo Liang, Ying Mei, Congming Shi, Yingbo Liu, Jingping Wu. 2017-01-18. OpenCluster: A Flexible Distributed Computing Framework for Astronomical Data Processing. https://doi.org/10.1088/1538-3873%2F129%2F972%2F024001

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