Why Markets Could (But Don't Currently) Solve Resource Allocation Problems in Systems

Abstract

Using market mechanisms for resource allocation in distributed systems is not a new idea, nor is it one that has caught on in practice or with a large body of computer science research. Yet, projects that use markets for distributed resource allocation recur every few years [1, 2, 3], and a new generation of research is exploring market-based resource allocation mechanisms [4, 5, 6, 7, 8] for distributed environments such as Planetlab, Netbed, and computational grids. This paper has three goals. The first goal is to explore why markets can be appropriate to use for allocation, when simpler allocation mechanisms exist. The second goal is to demonstrate why a new look at markets for allocation could be timely, and not a re-hash of previous research. The third goal is to point out some of the thorny problems inherent in market deployment and to suggest action items both for market designers and for the greater research community. We are optimistic about the power of market design, but we also believe that key challenges exist for a markets/systems integration that must be overcome for market-based computer resource allocation systems to succeed.