Internet Distributed Computing Projects
 
News and Articles   Active Projects   Upcoming Projects  
Recently Completed Projects   Past Projects  
Development Platforms   Conferences   Parody and Fun Sites   Links
 
last updated January 11, 2001
editor: Kirk Pearson
 
Updates
January 11, 2001
  • ProcessTree Network moves to the active projects roster as its first for-pay project begins
  • new upcoming project: NANO@Home (currently only a proposal, but maybe you can help make it a reality)
  • new news articles
  • stats updates for various projects
December 22, 2000
  • new active distributed human project: NASA clickworkers study. Help find craters in images of Mars.
  • new news article
December 20, 2000
  • Parabon Pioneer version 1.3.8 is now available
  • new news articles
December 15, 2000
  • new links page: distributed computing and processing links
  • new news articles
December 11, 2000
  • new active mathematics project: pi(x)
  • new news article
December 8, 2000
  • new news articles

What is Distributed Computing?

Distributed computing is a science which solves a large problem by giving small parts of the problem to many computers to solve and then combining the solutions for the parts into a solution for the problem. Recent distributed computing projects have been designed to use the computers of hundreds of thousands of volunteers all over the world, via the Internet, to look for extra-terrestrial radio signals, to look for prime numbers so large that they have more than one million digits, and to find more effective drugs to fight the AIDS virus. These projects are so large, and require so much computing power to solve, that they are be impossible for any one computer or person to solve in a reasonable amount of time.

This site is designed for non-technical people who are interested in learning about, and participating in, public, Internet-based projects which apply distributed computing science to solving real-world problems.

ThinkQuest has an excellent educational site which describes distributed computing, its history, and some of the current distributed computing projects. The site is available in English, Français, and Español.
An article about distributed computing by Byte Magazine.
A great, detailed overview of distributed computing by American Scientist.
Another overview, from the Cosm Project.

Major Areas of this Site
accessible by the links near the top of each page

News and Articles News stories, informational articles, and press releases about Internet-based distributed computing companies and projects
Active Projects Information, statistics and links for distributed computing projects that are active right now and that you can participate in
Upcoming Projects Information and links for distributed computing projects that are in development
Recently Completed Projects Information, statistics, and links for distributed computing projects that have been completed recently
Past Projects Information, statistics, and links for distributed computing projects that have been completed in the past and/or are no longer active
Development Platforms Information and links for development platforms that you can use to create a distributed computing
Conferences Information and links for conferences about distributed computing research and applications
Parody and Fun Sites Information and links for sites that make fun of major distributed computing projects. SETI@home seems to be a popular target :-)
Links Links to other sites which have distributed computing project links


Questions? Comments? Know of a site or project that isn't listed here? Found a broken or outdated link? Send me email.