A collection of (probably heterogeneous) automata whose distribution is transparent to the user so that the system appears as one local machine. This is in contrast to a network, where the user is aware that there are several machines, and their location, storage replication, load balancing and functionality is not transparent. Distributed systems usually use some kind of client-server organisation.

Distributed systems are considered by some to be the "next wave" of computing.

Distributed Computing Environment is the Open Software Foundation's software architecture for distributed systems.