Grid and Cloud Computing Alessandro Usai SWITCH Sergio Maffioletti Grid Computing Competence Centre - UZH/GC3

© 2010 SWITCH 2 Content Motivations Overview of a Grid Job (in a nutshell) Cloud computing: Amazon Web Services Grid Job revised Project Plan Conclusions

© 2010 SWITCH 3 Motivations : Main idea: dynamic allocation of resources! Grid is presented to end users as a large abstract computing and storage farm with virtually infinite resources Simple user interfaces are provided for specific usage of the grid infrastructure Resources are allocated upon user’s requests Users could be charged based on the effective usage of grid resources Applying scenarios: At peak time we may use extra cpu time/storage as Virtual Machines obtained from a Cloud. Virtual Machines from a Cloud could also be used for jobs with particular characteristics e.g. jobs very demanding in cpu/storage. Clouds can be local or remote. Virtual Machines also offer advantages in terms of Management/Deployment.

© 2010 SWITCH 4 Overview of a Grid Job (in a nutshell) User code + proxies/auth info + resources specs -> broker/match making -> chosen site gateway -> extra code bit added and submitted to the batch system (typically grid oblivious) -> jobs run on Worker Nodes. The batch system reports the info to the grid middleware which further propagates it; various checkpoints actions kick in to safeguard the output back to the user. Virtual Machines are needed here but: the User Interface, info system, gateway, batch system as well as Worker Nodes might already be all VMs. X509 proxy + user job Information System Batch System

© 2010 SWITCH 5 Cloud computing: Amazon Web Services (AWS) You register and you get access to the “clouds” I.e. US and/or EU zones X509 or RSA NAT Web Services Interface Account: Username and password XEN Virtual Machines Storage (s3)‏

© 2010 SWITCH 6 X509 proxy + user job Information System Grid Job revised The Batch System needs to be able to advertise the Cloud in a dynamic way, start up/stop the virtual machines, Submit/manage jobs, ….Some solutions are available (e.g. OpenNebula) but there is still work to be done. Batch System

© 2010 SWITCH 7 Project Plan First part: Assessment of existing solutions: this step also includes the definition of the use case requirements Development of the missing functionalities at the Batch System level Second part: Assessment of the authentication/authorization/accounting requirements Development/integration of the necessary AAI functionalities Implementation of a billing system

© 2010 SWITCH 8 Conclusions Cloud computing and dynamic resource allocation: fills in the hole for a use case not supported by traditional grid computing -> more interaction with cloud computing needed: challenging from the authentication, authorization and accounting point of view. Switch and the University of Zurich have expressed interest in submitting the project proposal by March Any other partners interested?

© 2010 SWITCH 9 Questions/feedback (appreciated:)?