We describe a robust library for parallel and dependable master-worker programs (raftnet). From a software client?s viewpoint, flexibility, hardware independence and ease of use are the main features offered by this library, while its users may take advantage of a framework that optimises the available redundant resources so as to reach at the same time dependability, high performance and load balancing. A wide variety of applications can be targeted without major rewritings of the existing sequential code. This paper describes the implementation of this library and provides evidence to our claims describing two case studies from vision and multimedia applications.