I want to combine various bare metal devices into a cluster. I wish to know if it's possible to use Xen as the basis for such a set up? I'm stuck at understanding how I can harness the various devices into a combined, single unit. Would one install dom0 on a single master device and network boot the other devices off that master device?

Virtualization clusters don't work like that. You have to set up every single node separately and then create a cluster using their IP addresses/hostnames. I don't know exactly how it is done in xen.

BTW if you want an easy virtualization/clustering solution look into Proxmox.

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I see, I'm afraid this is the way it's done.
I suppose if I install the hypervisor on each machine then I should be able to inherent a standardised image from a master to run on each machine, at least in principle?

Image as in a virtual disk for a virtual machine...?

I was referring to disk image. But if this can be generalised any further then I'm all ears
If this was generalised to an instance then I imagine I'd need identical copies of the hardware as well.

Virtualization is about running virtual machines on a physical host. Clustering bare metal devices can be done on a service level i guess but i don't think you have a simple way of "merging" physical machines.

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For many years I used to operate from a single notebook machine to do my work and communications etc.. I recently got a master desktop machine which I use as a server to run my work and I use the notebook to login into the master and I also take my notebook around with me when I am mobile. Each machine runs Debian. I am thereby maintaining two separate Debian distributions in total -- one on each device. My work is shared between the two machines and I use rsync to replicate backups on each.

For some time I have thought about this and I feel that this setup is too 'high maintenance'. I want to simplify and combine everything as much as possible in terms of the distribution, and then inherit the required services on the fly depending on usage. I would like to augment the master with possibly another high end machine and then use the notebook as a 'thin client' which draws functionality from the master/server combo.

There are many advantages to running a virtual machine and yet some negatives too.
Some of the commercial offerings have ways to convert P2V but it can be done usually other ways. P2V on windows tends to convert HAL also in process.

For the most part, think of a vm (of any kind) as a real computer. It makes little difference to the clients.

If you simply want to play with a setup that has a server and a thin client then you could try Knoppix. Boot Knoppix on one system and set up Knoppix terminal server. Then go to client and boot to pxe. In the script for terminal server it sets up what is one of the many typical ways.

There are many other ways to distribute resources too. Remote desktop of some kind.

There are many many ways to do what you want. I've never seen two web how to pages that are exactly the same.

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