This paper introduces C IEL, a universal execution engine for distributed data-flow programs. Like previous execution engines, C IEL masks the complexity of distributed programming. Unlike those systems, a C IEL job can make data-dependent control-flow decisions, which enables it to compute iterative and recursive algorithms. We have also developed Skywriting, a Turingcomplete scripting language that runs directly on C IEL. The execution engine provides transparent fault tolerance and distribution to Skywriting scripts and highperformance code written in other programming languages. We have deployed C IEL on a cloud computing platform, and demonstrate that it achieves scalable performance for both.
