UK-Ireland-France Regional Participation in NA4

EGEE-III INFSO-RI-222667

Enabling Grids for E-sciencE

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EGEE and gLite are registered trademarks

UK-Ireland-France Regional Participation in NA4

Dr Abdeslem DJAOUI

Coordinator UKIF region

STFC

RAL

UK



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Purpose of Regional Participation Activity?

• Ensure effective communication between users from national/regional Grid activities and NA4

• Coordinate and provide some support within the region– User and application porting support where appropriate.– Liaise with central EGEE support personnel.– Coordinate EGEE support activities in the region with support

provided by regional ROC.



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Regional Participation in NA4

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Expanded Application support in EGEE-III

• Regional team targeting more than the 7 existing strategic disciplines

• Reach and attract new scientific disciplines– Finance and Economics – Multimedia applications (Video & Image Processing, etc.) – Social Science and Humanities – Material Science – IC design – Aerospace Engineering – Mechanical Engineering …



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Centralized Support in EGEE-III

• Direct User Support– Deal with GGUS tickets, Manage/update end user documentation– 232 PM: GRNET, VUB, CNRS, INFN, SIGMA, TAU, IFAE, UNIMELB,

ASGC, CNU• Application Porting Support

– Technical analysis of problem and recommendations for methods and tools

– Help build prototype solution, but not complete porting– 261PM: KFKI RKMI, CNRS, INFN, IFAE, UNIMELB, ASGC

• Virtual Organization Support– VO management tools and Documentation– Support new and established VO’s– 70 PM: CNRS, GRNET, UNIMELB



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Working with users and existing support groups

• Complement but distinct from centralized EGEE support teams – Help new users acquire basic use of the Grid in a short time– Make sure regional users get effective support from the EGEE groups– Direct involvement with local application gridification when appropriate

• Complement but distinct from local support initiatives– Focus particularly on

EGEE services and tools International collaborations – using more than local resources Multidisciplinary applications

• coupled scientific models

• workflows

– Some overlap is unavoidable



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On going tasks

• Maintain Web Site/Wiki about support opportunities from EGEE• Collection and review of existing local documentation

– DUS should ensure consistency and consolidate knowledge centrally • First Line Application porting and support

– Legacy and new applications– Use GGUS as a formal procedure for further EGEE support

• Identify and collaborate with local support teams– NA2, NA3, SA1, NGS, …

• Build a Local Application Registry– Identify driving disciplines and their requirements in EGEE

• Support for RESPECT (Recommended External Software Packages for EGEE CommuniTies) program– Provide functionality that is needed by local users on EGEE– Expanded to include grid services and application-related, user-level

APIs and tools. • Communication to local regional scientific communities• Reporting to NA4



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UKIF federation in NA4

• UK, Ireland and France (UKIF) as one of 10 regions• 0.5 FTE for Coordination• Up to 1 FTE for administration and technical support• Split between STFC and Glasgow University• Biweekly meetings • Currently promoting activity

– Posters, Advertisements in Research Council newsletters, …

• Activity Working well in ScotGrid– Well integrated local and EGEE team

• New “Institut des Grilles” in France– Coordinating body of Grid activities in France



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Regional Participation and EGI

• Some Local Initiatives integrating well in EGEE NA4– Usually using gLite middleware– Some funding from EGEE for user/application support

• UKIF working with local Grid initiatives with various level of success – NGS seems to have good user support– Still need mutual awareness and cooperation with

NGS, GridIreland, LondonGrid, NorthGrid, SouthGrid local support teams As well as EGEE NA2, NA3, SA1

• NA4 interaction coordination = Benefits to Users– Avoid double effort– Act as a coherent team from users perspective

Without regard to which resources or middleware they use– Maximise any EGEE benefits to users– RP feeds the NGI/EGI model for the size and type of Local Application

Support that will be needed in the near future RP and local support need to be more integrated in EGI



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Some User benefits and incentives in NA4

• Available funding for regional users– Bringing Communities Together

Expenses for the UF invited speaker (non-EGEE-funded)

– New Community Bootstrapping Travel for identified “Key persons” to EGEE conferences and UF Help members of new communities to travel to application porting teams.

• Dedicated seed resources for new users– limited pool of start-up resources for new Virtual Organizations or new

users– Time limit of 6 months for usage– Users should join existing VOs or provision their own resources for a

new VO after.

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Further Information

• Regional Participation Web site/Wiki:

https://twiki.cern.ch/twiki/bin/view/EGEE/RegionalSupport

• UKIF regional participation team Email contact: [email protected]

• NA4 in EGEE-III

http://project.eu-egee.org/index.php?id=285

UK-Ireland-France Regional Participation in NA4

Documents