A caching model for efficient distributed network and systems management

Abstract

This paper is motivated by the increasing need for scalable, distributed architectures for integrated network, system and application management. Such integration and extension of functionality impose heavy performance requirements, in direct conflict with the increased volume of traffic produced. We present an attempt to minimize this traffic and overall response time, by applying the concept of quasi-copies (initially introduced in retrieval technology) in the collection process. The proposed scheme improves overall performance of distributed architectures by taking advantage of various consistency requirements, inherent in distributed applications. Components are organized in a distributed hierarchy of management information clients (managers) and servers (agents) or dual role entities. In an attempt to identify the expected performance gains, we present a simple queuing model that provides analytical results on expected improvement of response time and reduction of traffic.