1. Preamble

1.1 Disclaimer

We will not accept any responsibility for any incorrect information within this document, nor for any damage it might cause when applied.

1.2 Copyright

Copyright © 1997 - 1999 Jacek Radajewski. Copyright (C) 1999 Paralogic, Inc., 115 Bethlehem PA, 18015 (http://www.plogic.com).

This document is distributed under GNU GENERAL PUBLIC LICENSE Version 2, June 1991 Copies of the license can be down found at http://www.fsf.org/copyleft/gpl.html

1.3 About this HOWTO

Jacek Radajewski started writing the Beowulf HOWTO in November 1997 and was soon joined by Douglas Eadline. Over a few months the Beowulf HOWTO grew into a large document, and in August 1998 it was split into three documents: Beowulf HOWTO, Beowulf Architecture Design HOWTO, and the Beowulf Installation and Administration HOWTO. Version 1.0.0 of the Beowulf Installation and Administration HOWTO will be released to the Linux Documentation Project soon.

1.4 About the authors

• Jacek Radajewski works as a Network Manager, and is studying for an honors degree in computer science at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. Jacek's first contact with Linux was in 1995 and it was love at first sight. Jacek built his first Beowulf cluster in May 1997 and has been playing with the technology ever since, always trying to find new and better ways of setting things up. You can contact Jacek by sending e-mail to jacek@usq.edu.au
• Douglas Eadline, Ph.D. is President and Principal Scientist at Paralogic, Inc., Bethlehem, PA, USA. Trained as Physical/Analytical Chemist, he has been involved with computers since 1978 when he built his first single board computer for use with chemical instrumentation. Dr. Eadline's interests now include Linux, Beowulf clusters, and parallel algorithms. Dr. Eadline can be contacted by sending email to deadline@plogic.com

1.5 Acknowledgements

I would like to thank the following people for their help and contribution to this HOWTO: Rebecca Cox, Thomas Sterling, Donald Becker, Daniel Ridge, Thanh Tran-Cong, Christopher Vance, Ron Addie, Russell Waldron, David Smith, and many other people on the Beowulf mailing list who provided me with feedback and ideas.