The cluster computing research lab is a giant sandbox for technology geeks, Fred Kitchens, Ball State University associate professor of management, said.
The lab is a collection of older computers donated by companies that students can use to experiment with their ideas, Kitchens said.
"People are sometimes reluctant to try certain things with new computers," he said. "If something breaks, burns out, it's all free equipment to experiment."
Begun as a student project in the fall of 2001, the lab is located in Whitinger Business Building, Room 206 and contains around 200 computers that are hooked together to combine processing power similar to the ability of a supercomputer.
Students who are interested in using the lab can contact Kitchens to apply.
Kitchens said that cluster computers are becoming more popular in the business world for companies that need a lot of processing power.
Sophomore Alex Corn said a single supercomputer could cost millions of dollars, whereas a cluster of less powerful computers could cost a few tens of thousands of dollars. Kitchens said another benefit of a cluster is that computing power can continually and easily be added by hooking up more computers. As an example, Ball State's lab started with around eight computers in a small faculty office and now is in a larger lab with around 200 computers.
Examples of projects done using supercomputers include researching the coding of DNA, predicting weather patterns and ocean currents and rendering 3-D animation in motion pictures, Kitchens said.
Corn said a real-world example was "Lord of the Rings: Return of the King," where the producers realized they didn't have enough time to finish rendering all of the special effects. A single computer could take hours to render a single image, so the producers had to buy two thousand servers and cluster them all together in order to meet the December deadline, Corn said.
Projects that students are working on include a business fellows project with the Delaware County Emergency Management Agency, where students are using software to model the damage that results from rainfall and wind. Another project the students are working on is a 16-monitor video wall.
Last year students worked with Indianapolis International Airport to implement a cluster-computing setup.
The lab is not currently functioning at full capacity because State Farm and Mutual Federal Bank recently donated several computers that are still being installed into the cluster, Corn said.
Banks are more likely to donate large numbers of computers because they tend to replace all of their computers at the same time, Kitchens said.
In addition, one of the main cluster companies had a hard drive crash and some of the configuration files for the cluster were lost, so Corn is working on getting the cluster set up again as part of an honors fellowship.
Corn said the cluster should be fully functioning by the end of the semester.
Kitchens said that when the lab and accompanying cluster computer class were first created in 2001, there were only four other classes in the world. Even today, cluster labs and classes are very rare at the university level.
"It's a great resource for students to be able to just try things," Kitchens said. "Too often students are told exactly what to remember, lists and facts, and they never get a chance to just try something. I feel fortunate that Ball State is the kind of school that will support this kind of lab."
Corn said he hoped the work students do in the cluster computing lab will be able to benefit other people on campus. Once the lab is at full power, Corn said students are planning to set up a system for rendering the kind of high-quality images used in the "Lord of the Rings" movies, which could benefit students working on movies on campus.
Kitchens said the most important aspect of the lab is that it provides another method by which students can learn.
"A lot of learning goes on in just trying new things," Kitchens said. "Even if students fail there is still a lot of learning that goes on. A lot of learning is in troubleshooting, figuring out why it won't work. They're exposed to a lot more learning than they get from a textbook."
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