eScience Collaboration Tools: EVO & Access Grid Dr. Greg Wickham APAN 24th Jan 2008

Overview Overview of the Tools Access Grid EVO Comparison Summary

Overview Overview of the Tools Access Grid EVO Comparison Summary

Access Grid What is an Access Grid? Where? Collaboration? A collaboration environment Where? “a venue” - A virtual location where people can meet Collaboration? Audio Video Shared applications Shared Desktop Shared Web Browser Extensible Shared Resources

Access Grid Cross platform: Technology: Windows Linux Mac OSX Transmission: Multicast (predominately) Unicast (alternatively) Venue server and client Multiple computers combined in a node

Access Grid Environment: Community Room based (most common) Multiple computers controlled by the Venue Client Desktop (same software) Community http://www.accessgrid.org

Heritage Heritage MBone tools ( 90s’ ) Access Grid V1: VIC – Video Conferenecing Application RAT – Robost Audio Tool Access Grid V1: Venue Server concept Access Grid V2: (2002) Same (basic) tools Globus Toolkit (Web Services) Access Grid V3: (Aug ‘06) Jabber client integration Releases: 2.3 on 10 Sep 2004 2.4 on 26 Aug 2005 Same (basic) tools Globus Toolkit (Web Services) Access Grid V3: Releases 3.0 beta1 on 28 Jan 2006, beta2 on 16 Feb 2006, 3.0 on 3 May 2006 3.0.2 8 Aug 2006 3.1 Beta 1 on 29 June 2007 3.1 on 21 Dec 2007 Jabber client integration

AG Node

Access Grid Monitors combined to increase screen area (ie: 3072 x 768 pixels) Video Resolution: Usually H.261 @ CIF (352 x 288) c/w H.323 University of Queensland has demonstrated HD integration Enhanced VIC to display MPEG2

Venue Client “control centre” of the AG software Navigate between venues Venues are organised hierarchically Each Venue has:

Venue Client “control centre” of the AG software Navigate between venues Venues are organised hierarchically Each Venue has: List of available rooms

Venue Client “control centre” of the AG software Navigate between venues Venues are organised hierarchically Each Venue has: List of available rooms has a URI

Venue Client “control centre” of the AG software Navigate between venues Venues are organised hierarchically Each Venue has: List of available rooms has a URI a list of participants

Venue Client “control centre” of the AG software Navigate between venues Venues are organised hierarchically Each Venue has: List of available rooms has a URI a list of participants a chat client

VIC & RAT

Access Grid on a Desktop

Overview Overview of the Tools Access Grid EVO Comparison Summary

The Tools: EVO What is EVO? Where has EVO come from? A distributed collaboration tool incorporating: Video Audio White Board Share files Where has EVO come from? Funded by the High Energy Physics community (LHC) Where is EVO going? Gaining acceptance outside the HEP community Support contracts available

“Desktop Based Access Grid” So exactly what is EVO? Closest Analogy “Desktop Based Access Grid” Features: Uses Java – No software needs to be installed Firewall friendly H.323 Integration Desktop sharing Whiteboard Commercial support SIP & POTS Shibboleth Integration Multilanguage 10 Languages

EVO Running Windows XP Version shown (Uses OpenGL for fancy graphics) Other versions are similar to Vic (different video tiles are shown in independent windows)

Participants wearing headsets EVO Running Participants wearing headsets Most commonly EVO is used on desktop systems It can be used in room based systems too

EVO Running Speaker is emphasised

Layout controlled automatically EVO Running Layout controlled automatically

Terminology EVO – Enabling Virtual Organisations Panda Server – Back end infrastructure Koala – User client Vievo – Video Conferencing Client jRAT – Java Robust Audio Tool EVOWB – White Board

Architecture Each Koala connects into the ‘panda cloud’ All traffic to/from a Koala is to a specific panda

Architecture Panda servers exchange data (audio, video, etc) as necessary The ‘panda cloud’ is hidden from the end user

Koala

Redundancy Panda servers are the ‘data warehousing’ point All users data is exchanged to the EVO environment through the chosen panda server Upon connection the closest panda server is chosen User can prefer another panda server

Redundancy If the preferred panda server isn’t available – the next closest is chosen No action’s required by the user

Monitoring

Overview Overview of the Tools Access Grid EVO Comparison Summary

Unicast (Multicast) (3) Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO CODEC H.261 + others(1) H.261 + H.263 Transmission Multicast / Unicast (2) Unicast (Multicast) (3) Other codecs available (ie: MPEG2, HDTV) although not in the current AGTk distibution Multicast is the default; using a bridge Unicast is possible Multicast available through the JANET UK community

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO Firewall Difficult (1) Yes (2) NAT No (3) Yes (4) Ports defined on Venue Server; Unicast ports can vary (range) All traffic (video/audio/IM/Presence/booking/..) uses a well defined unique port Yes if using Unicast All video / audio handled through TCP connection to Panda

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO Data Transfer Direct between participants; or through bridge All data through Panda server Control Channel Venue Server (no redundancy) Panda server (redundancy) Installation Platform Specific Binaries Java & Java Web Start

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO H.323 No Yes (1) SIP Yes POTS Yes (2) Using a gate keeper possible to dial into an MCU or the PSTN using a standard phone number EVO Phone gateway in several places in US, Germany, Switzerland, Italy, Slovakia

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO Recording External Application Yes Chat Yes(1) Yes(2) Chat is limited to the currently active room Separate chat windows are maintained for each community and the currently active room

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO Presence No Yes Multiple Cameras Yes (1) Yes (2) Experience Level Moderate Beginner Room Based Common Possible Desktop Different Node configurations managed through venue server; rich configuration of cameras available Start additional cameras using ‘aux video’; camera control very simple

Feature Comparison Feature Access Grid EVO Shared Applications Desktop, Browser, (1) Desktop, Whiteboard Open Source Yes No Shared Applications can be written an integrated into the AG environment

Overview Overview of the Tools Access Grid EVO Comparison Summary

Summary Access Grid and EVO are both powerful multi-user collaboration tools Access Grid has: A large user base Strong community EVO has: Easy to use Cross Platform (Uses Java)

Summary Access Grid and EVO are both powerful multi-user collaboration tools Access Grid has: A large user base Strong community EVO has: Easy to use Cross Platform (Uses Java)

Summary So which one to use … Your choice!  Depends on the community … Access Grid works very well in room based systems EVO is a very simple desktop based system Your choice! 