Client/Server architecture was first proposed in the late 1980s as an alternative to conventional mainframe systems. Mainframe processing quickly becomes a bottleneck in any information system, but client/server models shift the processing burden to the client computer. Through workload sharing, client/server systems can improve overall efficiency while reducing budgets.

Companies are again searching for ways to improve their processing power without further investment in new hardware and software. Many client computers are idle most of the time, and have unused disk space....