The impact of data replication on job scheduling performance in the Data Grid

In the Data Grid environment, the primary goal of data replication is to shorten the data access time experienced by the job and consequently reduce the job turnaround time. After introducing a Data Grid architecture that supports efficient data access for the Grid job, the dynamic data replication algorithms are put forward. Combined with different Grid scheduling heuristics, the performances of the data replication algorithms are evaluated with various simulations. The simulation results demonstrate that the dynamic replication algorithms can reduce the job turnaround time remarkably. In particular, the combination of shortest turnaround time scheduling heuristic (STT) and centralized dynamic replication with response-time oriented replica placement (CDR RTPlace) exhibits remarkable performance in diverse system environments and job workloads. © 2005 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.