The MAFT architecture for distributed fault tolerance

Journal Article · Fri Apr 01 04:00:00 EST 1988 · IEEE Trans. Comput.; (United States)

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1109/12.2183· OSTI ID:7245083

Kieckhafer, R M; Walter, C J; Finn, A M; Thambidurai, P M

This paper describes the Multicomputer Architecture for Fault-Tolerance (MAFT), a distributed system designed to provide extremely reliable computation in real-time control systems. MAFT is based on the physical and functional partitioning of executive functions from application functions. The implementation of the executive functions in a special-purpose hardware processor allows the fault-tolerance functions to be transparent to the application programs and minimizes overhead. Byzantine Agreement and Approximate Agreement algorithms are employed for critical system parameters. MAFT supports the use of multiversion hardware and software to tolerate built-in or generic faults. Graceful degradation and restoration of the application workload is permitted in response to the exclusion and readmission of nodes, respectively.

• Research Organization: Dept. of Computer Science, Univ. of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE (US)
• OSTI ID: 7245083
• Journal Information: IEEE Trans. Comput.; (United States), Journal Name: IEEE Trans. Comput.; (United States) Vol. 37:4; ISSN ITCOB
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

99 GENERAL AND MISCELLANEOUS
990210* -- Supercomputers-- (1987-1989)
ALGORITHMS
COMPUTER CALCULATIONS
COMPUTER NETWORKS
COMPUTERS
DIGITAL COMPUTERS
FAULT TOLERANT COMPUTERS
FUNCTIONS
MATHEMATICAL LOGIC
REAL TIME SYSTEMS