The EGEE project: building an international production grid infrastructure

1. The EGEE project: building an international production grid infrastructure EGEE is a project co-funded by the European Commission under contract INFSO-RI-508833

2. EGEE - what is it and why is it needed? • Middleware – current and future • Operations – providing a stable service • Networking – enabling collaboration • Summary The material for this talk has been contributed by many colleagues in the EGEE & LCG projects. It is heavily based on Bob Jones’ talk at UK AHM 2004.

3. Technological push? • Is Grid technology merely a ‘funding opportunity’? • Is it an example of scientists wanting to do something because they (just about) could? • Is it in fact a technology driven activity, without any real purpose? • Consider this diagram

4. Grids vs. Distributed Computing • Existing distributed applications: • tend to be specialised systems • intended for a single purpose or user group • Grids go further and take into account: • Different kinds ofresources • Not always the same hardware, data and applications • Different kinds of interactions • User groups or applications want to interact with Grids in different ways • Dynamic nature • Resources and users added/removed/changed frequently

5. What is Grid Computing? • A Virtual Organisation is: • People from different institutions working to solve a common goal • Sharing distributed processing and data resources • Grid infrastructure enables virtual organisations “Grid computing is coordinated resource sharing and problem solving in dynamic, multi-institutional virtual organizations” (I.Foster)

6. The terms of the problem • Technological progress produces more sophisticated digital sensors (particle physics detectors, satellites, radio-telescopes, synchrotrons…) • Much of science is therefore becoming increasingly “data-intensive” • Huge amounts of data need to be analyzed by large and geographically distributed scientific communities • Consequently, single computers, clusters or supercomputers are not powerful enough for the necessary calculations and the data processing Result: access to large facilities is difficult and expensive for the scientific community, particularly in less favoured countries => increase of the “electronic divide”

7. The Grid: a possible solution • The World Wide Web provides seamless access to information stored in different geographical locations • The Grid provides seamless access to computing power and data storage capacity distributed over the globe • Relies on advanced software, called middleware: • authenticates, authorizes and accounts (AAA) • understands and locates the data which the scientist needs • distributes the computing processing to wherever in the world there is available and useful capacity • sends the results back The name Grid was chosen by analogy with the electric power grid

8. Challenges • Must share data between thousands of scientists with multiple interests • Must connect major computer centres, not just PCs (not P2P computing) • Must ensure that all data is accessible anywhere, anytime • Must grow rapidly, yet remain reliable for more than a decade • Must cope with different computer centres access policies • Must ensure data security

9. Benefits • Effective and seamless collaboration of dispersed communities, scientific first and then industrial • Ability to run large-scale applications aggregating thousands of computers, for very wide range of applications • Transparent access to distributed resources from your desktop • The term “e-Science” has been coined to express these benefits • In the vision of the “Knowledge Grid”, the Grid can act as unifying agent between applications and non homogeneous data

10. What are the characteristics of a Grid system? Numerous Resources Ownership by Mutually Distrustful Organizations & Individuals Different Security Requirements & Policies Required Potentially Faulty Resources Resources are Heterogeneous

11. What are the characteristics of a Grid system? Numerous Resources Standards Ownership by Mutually Distrustful Organizations & Individuals Connected by Heterogeneous, Multi-Level Networks Different Security Requirements & Policies Required Different Resource Management Policies Potentially Faulty Resources Geographically Separated Resources are Heterogeneous

12. EGEE Overview • Goal: • Create a world-wide production-quality Gid infrastructure for e-Science • on top of present and future EU Research Networking infrastructure • Build on: • EU and EU member states major investments in Grid Technology • International connections (US and AP) • Several pioneering prototype results • Large Grid development teams in EU require major EU funding effort • Approach • Leverage current and planned national and regional Grid initiatives and infrastructures • Work closely with relevant industrial Grid developers, NRENs and US-AP projects • http://www.eu-egee.org Applications Grid infrastructure Geant-NREN networks

13. Researchers perform their activities regardless geographical location, interact with colleagues, share and access data Scientific instruments and experiments provide huge amount of data The (Science) Grid Vision The Grid: networked data processing centres and ”middleware” software as the “glue” of resources.

14. Pilot New In 2 years EGEE will: • Establish production quality sustained Grid services • 3000 users from at least 5 disciplines • over 8,000 CPU's, 50 sites • over 5 Petabytes (1015) storage • Demonstrate a viable general process to bring other scientific communities on board • Propose a second phase in mid 2005 to take over EGEE in early 2006

15. EGEE and LCG EGEE builds on the work of LCG to establish a grid operations service • LCG (LHC Computing Grid) - Building and operating the LHC Grid • A collaboration between: • The physicists and computing specialists from the LHC experiment • The projects in Europe and the US that have been developing Grid middleware • The regional and national computing centres that provide resources for LHC • The research networks

16. EGEE Activities • 48 % service activities (Grid Operations, Support and Management, Network Resource Provision) • 24 % middleware re-engineering (Quality Assurance, Security, Network Services Development) • 28 % networking (Management, Dissemination and Outreach, User Training and Education, Application Identification and Support, Policy and International Cooperation) 32 Million Euros EU funding over 2 years started 1st April 2004 Emphasis in EGEE is on operating a production grid and supporting the end-users

17. EGEE - what is it and why is it needed? • Middleware – current and future • Operations – providing a stable service • Networking – enabling collaboration • Summary

18. gLite • “gLite” - the new EGEE middleware • Service oriented - components that are : • Loosely coupled (by messages) • Accessible across network; modular and self-contained; clean modes of failure • So can change implementation without changing interfaces • Can be developed in anticipation of new uses • … and are based on standards. Opens EGEE to: • New middleware (plethora of tools now available) • Heterogeneous resources (storage, computation…) • Interact with other Grids (international, regional and national)

19. Architecture Guiding Principles • Lightweight (existing) services • Easily and quickly deployable • Use existing services where possible asbasis for re-engineering • Interoperability • Allow for multiple implementations • Resilience and Fault Tolerance • Co-existence with deployed infrastructure • Reduce requirements on site components • Co-existence (and convergence) with LCG-2 and Grid3 are essential for the EGEE Grid service • Service oriented approach • Follow WSRF standardization • No mature WSRF implementations exist to date so start with plain WS (WS-I) • Provide framework to others so higher-level services can be developed quickly Architecture: https://edms.cern.ch/document/476451

20. EGEE - what is it and why is it needed? • Middleware – current and future • Operations – providing a stable service • Needs more than middleware • Organisational, operational infrastructure • Networking – enabling collaboration • Summary

21. User-view of EGEE: a multi-VO Grid User Interface User Interface Grid services

22. EGEE: adding a VO EGEE has a formal procedure for adding selected new user communities (Virtual Organisations): • Negotiation with one of the Regional Operations Centres • Seek balance between the resources contributed by a VO and those that they consume. • Resource allocation will be made at the VO level. • Many resources need to be available to multiple VOs : shared use of resources is fundamental to a Grid

23. SA1 - Operations • Scale of the production service • April 2004: ~2000 CPUs over ~ 30 sites (LCG-1 → LCG-2) • December 2004: ~8000 CPUs over ~ 80 sites (Migrated to Scientific Linux) • This is far beyond the project milestones! • Continuous improvements to LCG-2 middleware • Set-up of CIC/ROCs • Roles/responsibilities defined in execution plans • documented and implemented • On-going: • Complete set-up of pre-production service • Deployment planning for gLite (EGEE1 M/W version) • Deploy accounting infrastructure

24. Running the Production Service Grid deployment has entered a new phase • Basic middleware is working • responsible now for a small fraction of the problems • Outstanding performance/functionality issues • RLS, RB / little modularity & lack of consistent interfaces … • some solutions are being developed but many cannot be addressed in current software/architecture - set priorities for new middleware (gLite) • Many operational issues • mis-configuration, out of date mware, single points of failure, failover, mgmt interfaces … • resources unsuitable for applications needs (e.g. insufficient disk space) • slow response by sites to problems (holiday periods, security concerns) • new middleware will not help for many of these issues - grid partners must think Service • The grid still does not appear as a single coherent facility • applications must adapt to the current service to gain maximum profit • but result has been very effective for LHCb - ~3000 concurrent jobs

25. EGEE Operations (I): OMC and CIC • Operation Management Centre • located at CERN, coordinates operations and management • coordinates with other grid projects • Core Infrastructure Centres • behave as single organisations • operate core services (VO specific and general Grid services) • develop new management tools • provide support to the Regional Operations Centres

26. EGEE Operations: ROC • Regional Operations Centre responsibilities and roles: • Testing (certification) of new middleware on a variety of platforms before deployment • Deployment of middleware releases + coordination + distribution inside the region • integration of ‘Local’ VO • Development of procedures and capabilities to operate the resources • First-line user support • Bring new resources into the infrastructure and support their operation • Coordination of integration of national grid infrastructures Provide resources for pre-production service

27. Production grid service Launched Sept’03 with 12 sites, now more than 100 sites and continues to grow

28. Production grid service Launched Sept’03 with 12 sites, now more than 100 sites and continues to grow

29. Production grid service Launched Sept’03 with 12 sites, now more than 100 sites and continues to grow

30. Grid projects Many Grid development efforts — all over the world • UK e-Science Grid • Netherlands – VLAM, PolderGrid • Germany – UNICORE, Grid proposal • France – Grid funding approved • Italy – INFN Grid • Eire – Grid proposals • Switzerland - Network/Grid proposal • Hungary – DemoGrid, Grid proposal • Norway, Sweden - NorduGrid • NASA Information Power Grid • DOE Science Grid • NSF National Virtual Observatory • NSF GriPhyN • DOE Particle Physics Data Grid • NSF TeraGrid • DOE ASCI Grid • DOE Earth Systems Grid • DARPA CoABS Grid • NEESGrid • DOH BIRN • NSF iVDGL • EuroGrid (Unicore) • DataTag (CERN,…) • DataGrid (CERN, ...) • Astrophysical Virtual Observatory • GRIP (Globus/Unicore) • GRIA (Industrial applications) • GridLab (Cactus Toolkit) • CrossGrid (Infrastructure Components) • EGSO (Solar Physics)

31. Authentication User obtains certificate from CA Connects to UI by ssh Downloads certificate Invokes Proxy server Single logon – to UI - then Secure Socket Layer with proxy identifies user to other nodes UI Authentication, Authorisation CA Personal VO mgr VO service • Authorisation - currently • User joins Virtual Organisation • VO negotiates access to Grid nodes and resources (CE, SE) • Authorisation tested by CE, SE: gridmapfile maps user to local account VO database SSL (proxy) Gridmapfiles On CE, SE nodes

32. JRA3 - EGEE Authentication Scheme- EUGridPMA • Policy Management Authority: “Club” of trusted Certification Authority managers www.eugridpma.org • Green: CA Accredited • Yellow: being discussed Other Accredited CAs: • DoEGrids (US) • GridCanada • ASCCG (Taiwan) • CERN • Russia (HEP) • FNAL Service CA (US) • Israel • Pakistan Greece: Hellasgrid CA (AUTH)

33. EGEE - what is it and why is it needed? • Middleware – current and future • Operations – providing a stable service • Networking – enabling collaboration • Current application communities • Summary

34. Bringing new applications to the grid • Outreach events inform people about the grid / EGEE • Application experts discuss specific characteristics with the users • Migrate application to EGEE infrastructure with the help of EGEE experts • Initial deployment for testing purposes • Production usage - user community contributes computing resources for heavy production demands - “Canadian dinner party”

35. NA3 – User training and induction • NA3 has been involved in more than 130 training events across the world • (including the GGF and other grid schools) • ~2000 people trained • induction; application developer; advanced; activity retreats • Material archive online with ~1000 presentations • Strong links made with GILDA testbed and use of GENIUS portal • Regularly used as part of tutorials • Essential element of the virtuous cycle for new communities • Training is one of the first things new communities need • Process for handling feedback defined • Helping to improve material and organisation • Roadmap for future event planned • Open to new suggestions • Produced status report and update training plan taking into account lessons learned • On-going • Plan for next EGEE M/W (gLite) training

36. EGEE User Support: infrastructure • General approach: 3 main support centers to guarantee coverage 24/7 and 365 day support and provide a single point of contact to customers and to local Grid operations. To ensure 24x7 support, it was decided to have 3 GGUS teams in different time zones. GGUS started off at Forschungszentrum Karlsruhe in Germany in 2003 and has had a partner group at Academia Sinica in Taiwan since April 2004. A third partner in North America will complete the 24 hours cycle.

37. EGEE User Support: infrastructure • The ROCs and VOs and the other project wide groups such as the Core Infrastructure Center (CIC), middleware groups (JRA), network groups (NA), service groups (SA) will be connected via a central integration platform provided by GGUS. • This central helpdesk keeps track of all service requests and assigns them to the appropriate support groups. In this way, formal communication between all support groups is possible. To enable this, each group has to build only one interface between its internal support structure and the central GGUS application.

38. More about applications and communities in the next talk

39. EGEE - what is it and why is it needed? • Middleware – current and future • Operations – providing a stable service • Networking – enabling collaboration • Current application communities • Enabling new and effective use of EGEE • Summary

40. Who else can benefit from EGEE? • EGEE Generic Applications Advisory Panel: • For new applications • EU projects: MammoGrid, Diligent, SEE-GRID … • Expression of interest: Planck/Gaia (astroparticle), SimDat (drug discovery)

41. Intellectual Property • The existing EGEE grid middleware (LCG-2) is distributed under an Open Source License developed by EU DataGrid • Derived from modified BSD - no restriction on usage (academic or commercial) beyond acknowledgement • Same approach for new middleware (gLite) • Application software maintains its own licensing scheme • Sites must obtain appropriate licenses before installation

42. Summary • EGEE is the first attempt to build a worldwide Grid infrastructure for data intensive applications from many scientific domains • A large-scale production grid service is already deployed and being used for HEP and BioMed applications with new applications being ported • Resources & user groups will rapidly expand during the project • A process is in place for migrating new applications to the EGEE infrastructure • A training programme has started with events already held • Prototype “next generation” middleware is being tested (gLite) • Plans for a follow-on project are being discussed

43. When will the grid disappear? • Two possibilities: • 1. Grids will not fulfill their promise and fade into being a niche distributed computing domain • 2 Grids will become ubiquitous and easily usable – transparent to the user and so ‘disappear’ • Following the trajectory of other networked services