What is Grid Computing? Overview & Definitions GridKa-School 2006 P.Malzacher@gsi.de
What is Grid Computing? Best thing since the WWW. Don’t worry, the grid will solve all our computational and data problems! Just click “ Install” or The grid is “merely an excuse by computer scientists to milk the political system for more research grants so they can write yet more lines of useless code” [The Economist, June 21, 2001] “A distraction from getting real science done” [McCubbin]
The term Grid computing originated in the 1990s as a metaphor for making computer power as easy to access as an electric power grid.
Before Grids Researchers in many locations need to share resources FTP, telnet, blood, sweat and tears… and little support for collaboration There must be a better way of doing this!!! Scientific instruments, data stores and computers in many locations (next three slides stolen from Brian Coghlan)
With Grids Researchers in many locations need to share resources Resources connect to “The Grid” Scientific instruments, data stores and computers in many locations
DLEWARE Middleware Mobile Access Supercomputer, PC-Cluster Workstation Data-storage, Sensors, Experiments Visualising Internet, networks
1989-2001 invented Tim Berners- Lee at CERN the WWW to share information. Web Server, Web Clients Agreed protocols: HTTP, HTML, URLs Anyone can access information and post their own Moved quickly into public use.
Grids are the evolution of distributed systems to a wide area, multi-organizational context. The Web is a service for sharing information over the Internet, the Grid is a service for sharing computer power and data storage capacity over the Internet. The Grid goes well beyond simple communication between computers, and aims ultimately to turn the global network of computers into one vast computational resource.
The Grid Problem From “The Anatomy of the Grid: Enabling Scalable Virtual Organizations” Flexible, secure, coordinated resource sharing among dynamic collections of individuals, institutions, and resources. Enable communities (“virtual organizations”) to share geographically distributed resources as they pursue common goals -- assuming the absence of… central location, central control, omniscience, existing trust relationships.
What is the Grid? A Three Point Checklist Ian Foster, July 2002 A Grid is a system that: 1. coordinates resources that are not subject to centralized control 2. using standard, open, general-purpose protocols and interfaces 3. to deliver nontrivial qualities of service .
Grid Checklist: 1. coordinates resources that are not subject to centralized control … A Grid integrates and coordinates resources and users that live within different control domains for example, the user’s desktop vs. central computing; different administrative units of the same company; or different companies; and addresses the issues of security, policy, payment, membership, and so forth that arise in these settings. Otherwise, we are dealing with a local management system.
Virtual Organizations: Collecting resources around the world. Provide seamless access, with a single sign on.
Virtual organisation: people and resources collaborating - across admin, organisational boundaries. Single sign-on I connect to one machine – some sort of “digital credential” is passed on to any other resource I use, basis of: Authentication : How do I identify myself to a resource without username/password for each resource I use? Authorisation : what can I do? Determined by My membership of VO VO negotiations with resource providers Grid middleware runs on each resource User just perceives “shared resources” with no concern for location or owning organisation
Grid Checklist: 2. using standard, open, general-purpose protocols and interfaces A Grid is built from multi-purpose protocols and interfaces that address such fundamental issues as authentication, authorization, resource discovery, and resource access. It is important that these protocols and interfaces be standard and open . Otherwise, we are dealing with an application-specific system.
Grid and Web Services Convergence Application OGSA Web Service The definition of WS Resource Framework means that the Grid and Web services communities can move forward on a common base.
Web services: use case
Grid Checklist: 3. to deliver nontrivial qualities of service . A Grid allows ist constituent resources to be used in a coordinated fashion to deliver various qualities of service, relating for example to response time, throughput, availability, and security, and/or co-allocation of multiple resource types to meet complex user demands, so that the utility of the combined system is significantly greater than that of the sum of its parts.
Grid Perspectives Users Viewpoint: A virtual computer which minimizes time to completion for my application while transparently managing access to inputs and resources Programmers Viewpoint: A toolkit of applications, services, and API’s which provide transparent access to distributed resources Administrators Viewpoint: An environment to monitor, manage and secure access to geographically distributed computers, storage and networks.
The Integrating Role of Grid Infrastructure Multiple applications Coarse Fine Data Driven Dev / and workload types Grained Grained Workflow Test Consistent & open management interface Grid I nfrastructure End-to-end Quality of Service Consistent & open enactment interface Multiple resource types and instances
Economic foundations for infrastructure: Infrastructure: Everything that supports a number of applications and is specific to none; Including capabilities assisting the development, the provisioning, the administration and the execution of applications. Economic foundations for infrastructure supporting applications: Sharing of resources, Reuse of designs, Productivity-enhancing tools.
Benefits of sharing Lowered costs for provisioning and operating a new application based on an infrastructure already in place; Software requires a material infrastructure (hosts, data access, networks) to support is execution, sharing that material infrastructure can exhibit economics of scale. Statistical multiplexing to relieve congestions.
Reuse of designs: Reusable modules, components and frameworks seek to contain one of the most important costs, that of development. On the other hand, designing and developing reusable software modules, components and frameworks take considerably more time, effort, and expense than single-purpose designs. There must be a compelling expectation of multiple uses before this becomes economical feasible.
Tools Productivity enhancing tools are crucial to operation and development. By automating many tasks tools reduce time, effort, and expense, and contribute to quality. For a homogeneous infrastructure the cost of developing and learning the use of such tools are shared. Operation and administration processes and scripts can be shared.
Two Key Grid Computing Groups
The Globus Alliance is a community of organizations and individuals developing fundamental technologies behind the "Grid," which lets people share computing power, databases, instruments, and other on- line tools securely across corporate, institutional, and geographic boundaries without sacrificing local autonomy. The Globus Toolkit is an open source software toolkit used for building Grid systems and applications. It is being developed by the Globus Alliance and many others all over the world. A growing number of projects and companies are using the Globus Toolkit to unlock the potential of grids for their cause.
GGF18 Washington DC, USA September 11-14, 2006 The Global Grid Forum (www.ggf.org) Grid standard activities First meeting in June of 1999 Heavy involvement of Academic Groups and Industry Process Meets three times annually Solicits involvement from industry, research groups, and academics
What End Users Need (Slide from Globus Primer) Secure, reliable, on- demand access to data, software, people, and other resources (ideally all via a Web Browser!)
How it Really Happens (Slide from Globus Primer) Compute Server Simulation Tool Compute Web Server Browser Web Registration Portal Service Camera Telepresence Data Camera Monitor Viewer Tool Database Chat service Tool Data Database Catalog Credential service Repository Database Certificate service authority Users work Application services Collective services Resources implement with client organize VOs & enable aggregate &/ or standard access & applications access to other services virtualize resources management interfaces
How it Really Happens (Slide from Globus Primer) Implementations are provided by a mix of Application-specific code “Off the shelf” tools and services Tools and services from the Grid community (Globus + others using the same standards) Glued together by… Application development System integration
e-Science = Knowledge Grid Computing & management & e-Learning ONTOVERSE Astro Grid Medi Grid HEP Grid Text Grid Wikinger C3 Grid C3 Grid In Grid Generic platform and generic Grid services D-Grid Integration Project
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