Dconrails Gecco Presentation

Browser-based distributed evolutionary computation

Browser-based distributed evolutionarycomputation

Performance and scaling behavior

Merelo, Mora-Garcıa, Laredo, Lupion, Tricas

July 5, 2007


Outline

1 IntroductionAd-hoc ComputingStealth Computing

2 AJAX at workBasic mechanisms

3 Ruby on RailsWhy?

4 Distributed Computation on RailsGeneral scheme

5 ExperimentsSetupTests

6 Results

7 ConclusionsAll’s well that ends well

8 The EndThanks for your attention


Introduction

Ad-hoc Computing

What is your computer doing now?

Nothing!

... Probably


Introduction

Ad-hoc Computing

What is your computer doing now?

Nothing!... Probably


Introduction

Ad-hoc Computing

What is in every computer?


Introduction

Ad-hoc Computing

And every browser is a virtual machine

JavaScript is a standardlanguage, withimplementations in everybrowser.

JavaScript programs areembedded in websites,and run within thebrowser

Limitations: access tolocal files

Speed? Better don’t ask.


Introduction

Stealth Computing

Again, what’s your computer doing now?

Javascript programs rununnoticed

And they can call back


AJAX at work

Basic mechanisms

Asynchronous Javascript and XML

AJAX includes anasynchronous mechanismof communication basedin XML

Important thing about A:does not block thebrowser.


AJAX at work

Basic mechanisms

Checklist for AJAX

Most browser includeECMAScript/Javascript

Object model is mostlycompatible.

XMLHttpRequest objectrequired for async calls.


AJAX at work

Basic mechanisms

A picture is worth a thousand...


Ruby on Rails

Why?

It’s fast and small and sexy

Well, not really.

Rapid developmentenvironment based onRuby (the language),AJAX and a RDBMS(usually MySQL).

Natural communicationclient-server usingJavascript ObjectNotation (JSON).


Ruby on Rails

Why?

But there could be other alternatives

Really, all you need is aweb browser, a server and(X)Emacs

Google Web Toolkit couldbe an alternative

Also Django, or otherMVC frameworks.

RoR was just the firstthing we thought aboutwe knew how to code with


Distributed Computation on Rails

General scheme

There you have it



General scheme

Setting up the algorithms



General scheme

Downloading from server


Experiments

Setup

Experimental setup


Experiments

Tests

Floating-point tests usingthe 10-variable Griewankfunction.

F (x) =n∑

i=1

xi2

4000+

n∏i=1

cosxi√i+1

(1)

20-bit binarychromosome.

80% 2-point crossover,20% mutation.


Results

Which JS virtual machine?


Results

Effect of packet size


Results

Scaling behaviour


Results

Influence of debugging info on/off


Conclusions

All’s well that ends well

Still at the proof-of-concept stage

Stealth/browser-based evolutionarycomputation shows its promise.

Problems at the browser level: lowperformance of the JS virtual machineas compared with state-of-the-artlanguages.

But that will be solved in the nearfuture with JIT Tamarin

Problems at the server level: highlymultiprocessing, multithreaded,load-balanced server needed.

Or reduce server load by offloadingmost things to browser


The End

Thanks for your attention

Any question?

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