Resource management

Another responsibility of the administrator is to manage the resources of the grid.

This includes setting permissions for grid users to use the resources as well as tracking resource usage and implementing a corresponding accounting or billing system. Usage statistics are useful in identifying trends in an organization that may require the acquisition of additional hardware, reduction in excess hardware to reduce costs, and adjustments in priorities and policies to achieve utilization that is fairer or better achieves the overall goals of an organization.

Some grid components, usually job schedulers, have provisions for enforcing priorities and policies of various kinds. It is the responsibility of the administrator to configure these to best meet the goals of the overall organization.

Software license managers can be used in a grid setting to control the proper utilization. These may be configured to work with job schedulers to prioritize the use of the limited licenses.