Brief contents: introduction; an overview of cluster computing; node hardware; linux; network hardware; network software; setting up clusters: installation and configuration; how fast is my beowulf; parallel programming with MPI; advanced topics in MPI programming; rarallel programming with PVM; fault-tolerant and adaptive programs with PVM; cluster workload management; condor: a distributed job scheduler; maui scheduler: a multifunction cluster scheduler; PBS: portable batch system; PVFS: parallel virtual file system; chiba city: the argonne scalable; conclusions.