Web caching architectures: hierarchical and distributed caching
Pablo Rodríguez · 1999
In this paper we analyze the performance of hierarchical and distributed caching architectures. With hierarchical caching, caches are placed at multiple levels of the network. With distributed caching, caches are only placed at the bottom levels of the network and there are no intermediate caches. Our main performance measure is the expected latency to retrieve a Web document. We find that hierarchical caching has shorter connection times than distributed caching, thus, placing additional copies at intermediate network levels reduces the retrieval latency for small documents. We also find that distributed caching has shorter transmission times than hierarchical caching. Distributed caching has higher bandwidth usage than hierarchical caching. However, the network traffic generated by a distributed scheme is better distributed, using more bandwidth in the lower network levels, which are less congested. We also discuss administrative issues concerning the large scale deployment of distri...