Running a global production rule on data distributed over a plurality of machines may comprise receiving a local production rule that can run on each of the plurality of machines to jointly accomplish a global computation specified by the global production rule. The local production rule may be deployed to each of the plurality of machines, each of which stores a portion of the data and runs an instance of a rules engine that can run the local production rule. The plurality of machines are enabled to communicate intermediate data produced by the instance of the rules engine running the local production rule on said each of the machines. Coordinating between the plurality of machines is enabled to synchronize one or more local computations performed locally according to the local production rule on said each machine.