An Object Oriented Approach to Disseminate

Education by Applying Grid Computing Techniques

in Universities and Educational Institutions in India
Nirmala Devi. S1

Pethalakshmi. A2

RajaRajaeswari. R2

Department of Computer Science

Government Arts College for Women, Salem 8
Tamilnadu, India
Email: devi.dharu@gmail.com
2

Department of Computer Science

MVM Government Arts College for Women, Dindigul
Tamilnadu, India
Email: pethalakshmi@yahoo.com
ganesh_aakash@gmail.com
Abstract Education is the cornerstone for the development of
any economy based government. Globalization has been moved
into the educational sector and digitization has strongly paved its
way for education and now education is not only done through
chalk and talk but also through e-learning in metropolitan areas.
Knowledge dissemination can now be done through the digitized
internet technologies. Each and every individual should reap the
benefits of the education and research, which could be made
possible by the recent technique called grid computing. This
paper explores the various avenues available to empower the
educational sector by utilizing the grid technologies in
universities and represented as UML (Unified Modeling
Language).
Keywords Grid Computing, Education, e-learning, UML,
Object Oriented Approach.

I. INTRODUCTION
Education is the backbone for the development of the
economy. This education should also the reach the unreached
community equally in this globalized digitally - divided world.
Hence modern techniques like grid computing can be used for
empowering the education.
Grid computing is the way that the heterogeneous resources
in the heterogeneous environment can be shared to accomplish
a common goal such as computational task. This can be done
among the agreed organizations called VOs (Virtual
Organizations). This environment can be run over the internet
technologies or by a private network within a geographical
area. In grid computing environment the data, computational
task or service can be shared and efficiently used.
The object oriented approach can be used to show the
proposed approach. The bottom-up analysis is performed in
the OOAD(Object Oriented Analysis and Design). For this the
UML (Unified Modeling Language) can be used. The UML is
the pictorial representation of the object oriented design. There

were various diagrams available as use case diagram,

sequence diagram, collaboration diagram and package
diagram. This paper explores the various possibilities available
to put the educational institutions in the grid and make them
reap the benefits accruing out of grid computing through
UML.
II. ADVANTAGES OF GRID FOR EDUCATION & RESEARCH
Many approaches are proposed to make the research
community and the academicians to work by sharing the
knowledge and other resources. The following are considered
as advantages and also listed in [6].
A. Heterogeneous Environment
Each and every university in the grid may currently be
using any type of operating system as windows, unix, solaris.
These Universities may have database as oracle, DB2, Foxpro.
And they may be using any type of netware and hardware.
Whatever may be the existing system environment, because of
the heterogeneous environment, the existing system need not
change to any other environment like OS, database, netware.
The prevailing environment can itself be taken. The sample
environment is shown in Fig. 1.

Fig 1. Example for Heterogeneous Environment

B. Resource Sharing
The Key component of grid computing is resource sharing
in heterogeneous environment. The resource for the
universities and academic institutions can be of any type as
storage, computation and data.
When a research project is required to be executed in a
massively parallel processing environment, then it would be
better to go for grid environment. Similarly the educational
resources such as research articles, student database can be
shared in the grid. The software in one end can be used from
any other end. The other services could also be utilized to the
full extent in grid. Certain resources which were not even
available can be used from another end. The complicated
scientific research projects can be collaboratively done by the
scientists and researchers.
III. DEPLOYMENT OF GRID COMPUTING FOR EDUCATIONAL
SECTOR

The grid environment can be used in educational sector to

avail the following facilities:
A. Elearning
E-learning can be defined as a wide set of applications and
processes, which uses available electronic media and tools to
deliver vocational education and training [8]. Various
researches are over the e-learning using grid, as it facilitates
the usage of tools or resources from the environment.
Semantic web is also considered for deploying the grid.
Ontologys were also used in grid environment to enable elearning process. In [9], a new model is proposed to support elearning by developing e-content and placing it in the middle
layer.
B. CBT
Computer based Training (CBT) can also be efficiently
done through grid environment. It can be done in virtual
environment also. In [10], the virtual environment is proposed
through which computer based education can be performed.
C. Research Collaboration
The research ideas can be easily shared among the
participating educational institutions. And also the researchers
can work collaboratively to accomplish a particular research.
Normal redundant work can also be avoided by means of this
collaboration.
D. Grid Enabled Digital Library
The digital library when placed in grid, then that can be
used by the whole grid environment. The paperless
environment can be created and moreover the books,
magazines and other study materials could become universal
within the grid.
E. Sharing of Student Information
The information about the student can also be shared. The
workforce information can be well sought by the industries,
for employment purpose and even for making the students to
meet their requirement.

F. Availability of Resource Personnel

Even though the student from rural are blessed with
graduation, they are denied of research as there exist non
availability of resource personnel. By means of grid the
resource personnel can also in the environment, they can be
contacted through video conferencing and chat.
G. Connectivity
The prime and foremost advantage is the connectivity.
Because of this connectivity provided by the gird, the student
can listen to any class or any special talks on any topic in the
grid. The research scholar can have the problem solved, the
complex problems can be solved by means of parallel
computing supported by grid. The paper-less environment can
be created as student can access to the online content
available. [12]
IV. THE GRID ENVIRONMENT
The grid is the agreement between the participating entities
in the environment. The universities can be the virtual
organizations (VOs) which comprises of the colleges
affiliated to it. Each and every college affiliated to the
university can be the member of that respective virtual
Organization (VOs), which can share the data, service and
computation among them and between the VOs. This is
depicted in the fig. 2. Fig. 2 considers the four sample virtual
organizations, each VOs are the universities. Every university
would have the colleges affiliated to it as participating nodes
in the environment.
Virtual Organization B

Virtual Organization A

University
B

University
A

University
C

University
D

Virtual Organization D
Virtual Organization C

Fig. 2 The grid environment for the University

V. THE ARCHITECTURE OF PARTICIPATING VOS

The lower level consists of grid computing environment,
which comprises of the colleges and universities that need to
communicate with one another or share the resources. The
middle layer can be either the private network or the internet
technologies. This paper considers the internet technologies
as the set up cost can be reduced. At the top level of the

architecture the participating nodes can request or serve a

resource. And this is depicted in the following fig. 3.

activities are depicted in the use case diagram which is shown

in fig. 4.

Fig. 3. Architecture of grid supported university and college

VI. USE CASE MODEL FOR THE PROPOSED APPROACH

The proposed approach can be best designed by applying
the object oriented approach. The object oriented approach
uses the bottom up approach. It considers the data at first
and then the importance is given to the function oriented
approach.
The UML (Unified Modeling Language) are used to design
the environment. The UML consists of pictorial representation
to denote the requirements. There were various diagrams
available as use case diagram, sequence diagram,
communication diagram, package diagram, class diagram,
deployment diagram, collaboration diagram, activity diagram,
state diagram. Each and every diagram is for a unique purpose
and to explain the proposed approach the following diagrams
are used in this paper.
A. Use Case Diagram

The use case diagram depicts the functionalities induced by

the actor. The actor can be a person, an object or even an
external entity. In our proposal, we have considered the
following as actor viz., student, Faculty, Librarian, Resource
Personnel, Research Scholar and university official. The use
case diagram is shown in figure 4.
Here the student can enroll in the grid environment and he
can perform tasks as listening to a lecture or seminar, using the
digital library, using the software, paying fees or making use
of any resources in the grid. Similarly the research scholar
which is derived from the student entity can also perform the
tasks as applying for grant, submitting a job which needs to be
executed parallel. The Librarian needs to give the access rights
to the students in the grid. The university official need to
handle the fee receiving process and offering the grant to the
students. The resource personnel could be the person
specialized in an area, who are able to deliver special lectures
or who can act as guide to the research scholar. These

Fig 4 Use Case Diagram for the proposed approach

B. Sequence Diagram
The sequence diagram is used to list the sequence of
activities that can be performed to accomplish a particular
task. The sequence diagram consists of the life line which
shows the life of the process and the communication within
and among the processes. Thus the Sequence diagram is
shown in figure 5 depicts the student interaction with the grid
environment. The student logins and can listen to the lecture,
access the grid enabled digital library, pay fees. Another class
of student called research scholar would do the operations and
it is shown in fig. 6.

In fig 6, the messages are numbered from 1 to 5. In 1 the

research scholar have to login to the system. From 2.1 to 2.3
indicates the communication regarding the grant to be received
from the university. Where 2.1 is for applying grant, 2.2 is for
checking process and 2.3 is to sent back the information.
Similarly the 3.1 & 3.3 is to get appointment with a resource
person. In 3.1 the user would request for appointment and it
would be processed in 3.2 and through 3.3 it is intimated to the
scholar. Through 4.1 the user can submit the complex
problems and it the processing is mentioned in 4.2. And final
information to user is given in 5.
C. Package Diagram
The package diagram shows the packages that were
available in the grid. From the diagrams available the
packages were derived. The packages are managing class/
seminar, grid enabled digital library, grant the process, load
balancing. The package diagram is shown in fig. 7.

Fig 5. Sequence diagram for student interaction through login.

Fig. 7. Package diagram of the grid environment

VII. POSSIBLE OUTCOMES OF THE PROPOSED APPROACH
The proposed approach results in the following outcomes
and was beneficial to the participants in the grid. The student
can listen to any lecture anywhere, anytime. Similarly the
research scholars could also access to the grid and can request
the grant, access the digital library and able to contact the
resource personnel. The birds eye on research could be made
since the networking is available over the entire country. Thus
the proposed approach leads to great advantage and breaks the
digital divide caused and brings the real meaning to
globalization.
VIII. CONCLUSION
Fig 6. Sequence Diagram for the Research Scholar Interaction System

ICT has led to digital divide not only in terms of money but
also knowledge, while students in metros enjoy the benefit of
elearning tools and techniques. Rural students are void of

many facilities in their places. Resources for research are

blank-tanks in rural colleges. Empowered online learning
program, enriched libraries assist students in cities facilitating
their research journeys and grid computing techniques can fill
this gap offering virtual libraries and research options at rural
places
Thus sharing of online resources amongst the cluster of
educational institutions through grid computing technique
makes the system cost-effective. Also the available online
educational program on virtual class room at the click of the
mouse, a boon from grid computing ensures the rural students
gets the same number of choices as city students.
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