Reliability of replicated files in partitioned networks

Before replication can become a practical way to improve the reliability of general-purpose file systems, robust low-cost methods must be available. The reliability provided by a novel consistency control algorithm, suitable for networks which may become partitioned, is compared to that provided by other schemes. The extent to which the reliability of replicated files is affected by the communication network´s topology (and therefore the probable failure modes of the system) and the placement of file copies is presented as an important measure of the suitability of such algorithms. The results of a comparative study of this phenomenon are presented