Master-slave vs peer-to-peer distributed computing

Question

HBase has a master-slave model, while Cassandra has a peer-to-peer model. I am aware that in a master-slave model, the master is a SPOF (Single Point of Failure) and there is no such thing in a peer-to-peer model.

Are there any other pros and cons of each model? Specially I am looking for any advantages of master-slave over the peer-to-peer model.

Freespoken

Might be a bit too discursive for StackOverflow, but since you've good reputation, you might get away with it ;-) – Zip

I know it's a bit discursive. I am planning to spend some time on either HBase or Cassandra, so I started looking at both of them. So, the query? I could not get a comparison of these two models. So, any pointers are appreciated. – Freespoken

Answer 1

One side point is that the master is not a SPOF in HBase, as you can have a Multi-Master configuration. http://wiki.apache.org/hadoop/Hbase/MultipleMasters

Having the masters makes it a little easier to know where the data is and where it is going. It's also based on Hadoop, so the integration with Map Reduce is quite nice (where a Map job will naturally split out to the region servers and give you a row). I think this is the main plus.

Cassandra's primary "con" is the eventual consistency model, although it allows you to choose consistency models.

One comparison point is that data in HBase is sorted by key, where it is random in Cassandra. This can provide some benefits with smart keys in HBase, although you can always choose a GUID or random key to emulate Cassandra's behavior. Cassandra can partition non-randomly, but HBase is still better for range scans.

I've used both, and they both work, and both take a lot of work to keep working.

Forestforestage

I looked at both Cassandra and HBase and am a bit familiar with both of them - as mentioned in the OP the query was about Master-slave vs peer-to-peer distributed computing. Pros and cons of these two distributed computing models. – Freespoken

My main point was to correct your assertion that the master in HBase is a SPOF, since multiplemasters are possible. The features I mentioned in Hbase are those enabled by having a master control the data partioning. – Forestforestage

Answer 2

Master-slave structure is more effective, P2P is more stable

Utility