Simulation of grid computing infrastructure: challenges and solutions

Recent advances in middleware technologies such as grid computing have provided IT architects with the ability to design infrastructures that are more flexible and less dedicated to specific application workloads. However, the capabilities of design and analysis tools that IT architects use have not kept pace. In this paper, we describe our progress in developing an IT infrastructure modeling environment that supports an extensible set of analysis tools. We focus in particular on a discrete-event simulator for analyzing the performance of computational workloads that are running on a grid. The unique modeling requirements and challenges presented by the grid computing infrastructure domain are discussed. Efficient event queue management and other simulation techniques to address these challenges are developed. Finally, we position the role of simulation analysis in the larger context of estimating the business and financial returns from grid computing investments.