The Cactus Portal A Case Study in Grid Portal Development Michael Paul Russell Dept of Computer Science The University of Chicago

Grid Portals Defined A short description Grid Portals are a class of www application servers that provide a secure online environment for gathering information about Grid services and resources as well as provide tools for utilizing these Grid services and resources to perform useful tasks.

Just a few examples Example Portals  The Astrophysics Simulation Collaboration Portal A Cactus Portal Application  SDSC Hot Pages A Web-based Interface to NPACI Computing Resources  WebSubmit A Web-based Interface to High Peformance Computing Resources

What Grid Portals have in common Grid Portal Properties  Highly-available multi-user www application servers.  Accessible with common www thin-client technology.  Provide secure remote access to Grid resources & services.  Provide consistent interfaces to diverse sets of services.  Provide a comprehensive view of Grid resources & services.  Often serve the needs of a specific community of Grid users.

Grid Portals Grid-Enable Additional Functions  Secure online access to remote system tools.  A platform for distributing and running software on the Grid.  A platform for publishing information about resources.

Typical online tools Grid Portal Provisions Grid Software Management Grid Data Management Information Queries Grid Security Management Grid Resource Management Tools for secure access to stored user proxies for authenticating to multiple Grid sites & services. Tools for defining queries to determine resource availability & status, dataset location, monitoring jobs, etc. Tools for configuring user resources such as specifying appropriate location for mass secondary data storage on remote file systems. Tools for common file management on remote sites; tools for locating and accessing large shared datasets, etc. Tools for checking out, compiling, deploying and configuring software on remote sites, running and monitoring software during execution.

Architecture Overview Secure HTTPD Grid Portal Site boundary Client code downloaded onto http client DHTML XML/XSL Java applets Relational DBMS Data File systems Files Information managed & stored on site Portal information User information Task information Resource information JSP Server Middleware libraries Application logic Service Libraries GlobusJDBC… Presentation layer Grid Information Service Data Persistent storage systems

Architectural points Key Properties  Built upon common www application client-server technology.  Leverage Grid technology for access to data and computing.  Utilizes Grid Security Infrastructure (GSI) software.

Commonly accessed services Application Services Grid Information Index Service  Organizational information  Grid resource information  Grid security information  Grid user information Grid Resources Comp Grid computational services Data Grid data storage services Soft Grid software repositories GIS Grid information services MyProxy Service Proxy Secure proxy storage & retrieval

Grid Architecture WWW Portal Soft GIIS WWW Client WWW Client WWW Client Proxy Comp Data GIS Comp Data GIS Soft GIS MyProxy ServicePortal GIIS The Application Grid is the set of services available on sites distributed throughout the Grid. Grid Portals utilize these services as well as provide users with this view of the Grid. Data

Grid Portal Client Software Software Requirements  Internet browser (Netscape 4.0+ or Internet Explore 4.0+) GSI Client software  MyProxy Client Software (

The Cactus Portal A Case Study The Cactus Portal is an online environment for building, distributing, running and monitoring Cactus applications. More importantly, it provides tools for helping users to effectively utilize the entire set of Grid computational and data management services to which they have access.

Cactus Defined What is Cactus? “Cactus is a freely available, modular, portable and manageable environment for collaboratively developing high- performance multidimensional simulations”

Look familiar? Cactus Portal Provisions Grid Software Management Grid Data Management Information Queries Grid Security Management Grid Resource Management Tools for secure access to stored user proxies for authenticating to Grid sites & services. Tools for defining queries to determine resource availability & status, dataset location, monitoring jobs, etc. Tools for configuring user resources such as specifying appropriate location for mass secondary data storage on remote file systems. Tools for checking out, compiling, deploying and configuring software on remote sites, running and monitoring software during execution. Tools for common file management on remote sites; tools for locating and accessing large shared datasets, etc.

Cactus Portal Architecture Stronghold Grid Portal Site boundary Client code downloaded onto http client DHTML File systems Files Information managed & stored on site Portal information User information Task information Resource information Tomcat CoG/GPDK Portal Java Service Libraries CoGJava IO… Portal DHTML/JSP

Application Components Cactus Grid Components Globus Java Libraries GSI-FTPGRAMGSI-LDAPMyProxy Cactus Java Software Make MgmtFile MgmtJob MgmtCVS Mgmt Cactus JSP Software Parameter Files Mgmt Source Mgmt Job Mgmt Application Mgmt

Cactus Portal Grid Portal GIS Proxy MyProxy ServicePortal GIISCactus CVS Soft myproxy.ascportal.orggiis.ascportal.orgcvs.cactuscode.org Comp Data GIS Comp Data GIS Data Comp Data GIS Comp Soft GIS Comp Data Personal repository Each user selects one site on the Grid to be her personal repository from which software and data is deployed onto other sites on the Grid. This allows a user to interact with the repository outside of the the Cactus Portal and potentially to use this same repository in conjunction with other Grid Portals The Cactus Portal uses a publicly shared Cactus Software Repository in conjunction with allowing users to import custom libraries for distribution onto Grid sites.

Cactus Portal Goals Future Goals  Develop generic and robust source code management tools.  Develop generic and robust grid data management tools.  Allow users to share access to data and software.  Develop robust online administration tools.  Develop reusable Grid Portal software libraries.

Integrated environments Research Ideas  Build an online Cactus integrated development environment (IDE).  Develop online scripting environment for customizing tasks. Source MAKE GDB EditCompileDebugRun CVS Version for (ii = 0; ii < 20; ++ii) { appl.setParameterFile(parf[ii].getUrl()); appl.run(); }