Checkpointing Algorithms for Fault-Tolerant Execution of Large-Scale Distributed Applications in Cloud

Abstract

Cloud computing provides infinite resources and a suitable environment for the execution of large scale computing applications. However, it is also susceptible to frequent failures which can affect users as well as service providers adversely. Therefore, fault tolerance techniques are necessary for the reliable execution of applications in the cloud. This work presents checkpointing based fault tolerance protocols for two types of distributed applications. The first kind of applications is the Bags of Tasks (BoT) applications where an application comprises of a set of independent tasks that do not communicate with each other during execution. Hence, an uncoordinated checkpointing algorithm is proposed for fault tolerance of BoT applications. Subsequently, we consider large scale distributed applications composed of multiple tasks dependent on each other due to inter-task message passing. An uncoordinated checkpointing and message logging protocol is presented for this type of applications. The proposed protocols utilize storage at edge switches in a data center to reduce the bandwidth consumption for saving checkpoints and message logs. Simulation results have demonstrated that the proposed protocols provide an increased rate of successful recoveries from failures and cause lower resource overhead than other contemporary and related schemes.