Distributed and Autonomic Minimum Spanning Trees

Abstract: The most common strategy for enabling a process in a distributed system to broadcast a message is one-to-all communication. However, this approach is not scalable, as it places a heavy load on the sender. This work presents an autonomic algorithm that enables the $n$ processes in a distributed system to build and maintain a spanning tree connecting themselves. In this context, processes are the vertices of the spanning tree. By definition, a spanning tree connects all processes without forming cycles. The proposed algorithm ensures that every vertex in the spanning tree has both an in-degree and the tree depth of at most $log_2 n$. When all processes are correct, the degree of each process is exactly $log_2 n$. A spanning tree is dynamically created from any source process and is transparently reconstructed as processes fail or recover. Up to $n-1$ processes can fail, and the correct processes remain connected through a scalable, functioning spanning tree. To build and maintain the tree, processes use the VCube virtual topology, which also serves as a failure detector. Two broadcast algorithms based on the autonomic spanning tree algorithm are presented: one for best-effort broadcast and one for reliable broadcast. Simulation results are provided, including comparisons with other alternatives.