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Final Year Project Proposal
Batch 2003
(WebFS) Web File System
Project Supervisor
Team Members Talha Ekram s2185Syed Asim Imtiaz s2193Imad Qamar
s2190Amyn Ghazali s2197
A s e n i o r p r o j e c t p r o p o s a l s u b m i t t e d i
n p a r t i a l f u l f i l l m e n t o f t h e r e q u i r e m e n
t s f o r t h e d e g r e e o f
B a c h e l o r o f S c i e n c e o n 5 -O c t - 0 6
The Department of Computer ScienceNational University of
Computer and Emerging Sciences
Karachi Campus.2005-2006
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Table of Contents
1.Abstract
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3
2.Background and Justification
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3
3.Research Methodology
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5
4.Project Scope
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5
5.High level Project Plan
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6
6.References
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6
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1. Abstract
As the computer scientists agree, this is the era that can be
termed as Data & information age. Data storage, retrieval and
its ease of scalability are the issues in hand these days.
A Distributed File system (DFS) is a file system that supports
sharing of files across different machines over some distributed
network or even intranet. The key goal of DFS is to ensure
transparency and provide a set of primitives for file
operations.
Many Distributed file systems have been developed to cater the
growing needs of data storage. These distributed systems usually
work on a specific file system (for example Network File System).
Although these systems provide a set of primitive for file
operations integrated with the OS, but none of them are capable
enough to be an Internet accessible file-system.
Our proposal is to create such a file system which is
distributed, de-centralized, scalable and most importantly
accessible by Web Services API (or a protocol).
2. Background and JustificationThe advent and boost of
networking and network environment caused a surge in demand for
Network / Distributed file systems. Conventional File Systems had a
lot of issues in terms of security, scalability and reliability
when working for and over the network.
Now, even as the desktop applications are now porting to
web-based applications; conventional File Systems as well as
network file systems are causing a lot of issues when a web
application is distributed and is expected to scale further. With
such a tremendous growth of data-rich applications on the Internet,
there is a serious demand of an exclusive File System for the
internet.
An Internet file system will comprise of a distributed file
system, but not limiting it to the Physical networks. It can be
distributed over the internet as geographically dispersed.
Additionally, the most important feature of such a file system is
to provide a Web Services API (or Protocol) for file manipulation
and operations. Currently, there is no such File System that
provides a Web Services enabled file system.
For example, Google has developed its own Google File System to
cater its growing need of data management but they are targeted
exclusively for Googles work load and its applications. Simply put,
our aim is to develop a generalized File System accessible by means
of Web APIs (or protocol).
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Web File System Architecture
WebFS client application
WebFS Web application
Web services WebFS Protocol
De-centralized approachfor locating File(s)
DistributedFile servers
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3. Research MethodologyThe development cycle consists of
following steps:
1. Development of detailed objectives and specifications of
the
system.
2. Study other Distributed File Systems which can help us
understand the clear picture of what a Web File System should
do.
3. Detailed study of issues & its possible implementation
like:
a. File access patterns and issues over a distributed file
system
b. Unified naming over distributed network
c. De-centralization of the File System
d. Distributed authentication issues
4. Establishing a small test-network of file servers
5. Implementation of primitives for file operations
6. Transformation and porting the file operation primitives to
Web
Services API (or a protocol)
7. Efficiency issues to improve overall system performance and
to
study what can be done to induce fault tolerance
4. Project ScopeThe project scope covers:
1. Implementation of various algorithms, approaches and
protocols that might become a sub-part of the over-all system:
a. Unified and unique names over distributed networkb.
De-centralized approach of resolving namesc. Peer-to-Peer /
Client-Server architecture to access file on
a server2. Implementation of the system
a. Merge and vitalize above separate implementations into a
single usable system
b. Instantiation of a small test-network3. Implementation of Web
Services API (or a protocol) to be used
over the Internet4. A small demonstration of the Web Services
API
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Our project scope does not cover:1. A full-featured web
application based on the above API.2. Inadvertent and inhibited
security issues and implications of the
system.3. Huge handling of data e.g. file-size in GBs.
5. High level Project Plan
Activity List
Gantt chart
Resource Sheet
6. Referencesa. Patent: Server-less distributed file system
http://www.patentstorm.us/patents/7062490.htmlb. Patent:
Distributed File Systems providing a unified name-
space with efficient name
resolutionhttp://www.patentstorm.us/patents/5701462.html
c. Web File System-File-like Access to the
Webresearch.microsoft.com/~adya/pubs/wfs.html
d. Google File Systemlabs.google.com/papers/gfs-sosp2003.pdf
1.Abstract2.Background and Justification3.Research
Methodology4.Project Scope5.High level Project Plan6.References
