Sideband Computing

Sideband computing is a general term for an area of computer science that is related to the distributed computing and multiple communication channels.

Sideband is defined as when a user connects to some normal network service, a separate communication channel is opened through which a server distributes tasks to the clients. Through sideband computing method, any network server which has a lot of clients can form into a large-scale super-computing network. During this process, the resources in the clients could be utilized through the central server so long as the main channel is maintained.

Generally, the task could be any task that is performed by individual client and used in the various distributed computing environment such as social computing, volunteer computing, and edge computing, grid computing, or utility computing. Collaborative task in social computing is one example.

Sideband computing is also a type of super computing where each client carries out some real computation tasks that could be the individually executed. With the server aggregating the results from each client, it effectively achieves the function of a real super-computer.