Abstract: This invention relates to a machine implemented method of executing CPU instructions on a plurality of computers in one or more locations, logically arranged in a weighted, lattice-like structure representing information about CPUs, CPU cores, operating system threads, network interconnects, and computer locations in a many-to-many relationship. This approach, by weighting nodes and costing edges, provides a natural method for commoditizing the execution of a workload. Furthermore, this approach lends itself to a means of determining the incremental value (or cost) of additional nodes. Consequently, the creation of a virtual crowd-sourcing market—in which either CPUs singularly or lattices as a whole are market participants—is a natural extension of the method.

Abstract: An improved method for dividing and distributing the work of an arbitrary algorithm, having a predetermined stopping condition, for processing by multiple computer systems. A scheduler computer system accesses a representation of a plurality of work units, structured as a directed graph of dependent tasks, then transforms that graph into a weighted graph in which the weights indicate a preferred path or order of traversal of the graph, in turn indicating a preferred order for work units to be executed to reduce the impact of inter-work unit dependencies. The scheduler computer system then assigns work units to one or more worker computer systems, taking into account the preferred order.

Abstract: A base computer system obtains a set of definitions of calculations to be performed, and periodically monitors a data store to see if the data required for the calculations are available. When the required data for a given calculation are available, the base computer system sends the data and calculation instructions to a group of one or more remote computer systems for execution. The remote computer systems may be equipped with Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) for high-performance computation. The base computer system then awaits the return of reports from the one or more remote computer systems.