Become a Marketplace Partner

Search SBC

Search internet.com

internet.com IT Developer Internet News Small Business Personal Technology International Search internet.com Advertise Corporate Info Newsletters Tech Jobs E-mail Offers

Enter a keyword...

...or choose a category. choose one... Communications Computer Industry Companies Computer Science Data Graphics Hardware Internet and Online Services Mobile Computing Multimedia Networks Operating Systems Programming Software Standards Types of Computers World Wide Web

distributed processing Last modified: Sunday, September 01, 1996
Refers to any of a variety of computer systems that use more than one computer, or processor, to run an application. This includes parallel processing, in which a single computer uses more than one CPU to execute programs. More often, however, distributed processing refers to local-area networks (LANs) designed so that a single program can run simultaneously at various sites. Most distributed processing systems contain sophisticated software that detects idle CPUs on the network and parcels out programs to utilize them. Another form of distributed processing involves distributed databases, databases in which the data is stored across two or more computer systems. The database system keeps track of where the data is so that the distributed nature of the database is not apparent to users.
Real-Time and Distributed Systems Research Group Home page of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill Real-Time and Distributed Systems Research Group. It contains links to current research projects as well as technical papers. Yahoo!'s distributed computing page Yahoo!'s directory of distributed computing companies and software.	Related Categories Operating Systems Related Terms database management system DCE distributed database local-area network parallel processing