1. www.gisela-grid.eu Grid Initiatives for e-Science virtual communities in Europe and Latin America Involvement of VRCs in GISELA Philippe Gavillet CETA-CIEMAT (Spain) & CERN (Switzerland) Luis Trejo ITESM (Mexico) GISELA KOM, 21 st - 24 th September 2010 San Luis Potosí (Mexico)

2. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 2 Preamble Proposal to have an interactive session In practice: –From WP3, WP4,.. presentations + recent EGI Tech. Forum, + discussions at this meeting + personal views:  Take all current aspects of VRC involvement in GISELA  Introduce each point (1slide) for interactive discussion –Important: keep trace of the discussion. We could make a Working Note out of it, as backup doc for further discussion. (22/10/10): The notes of the discussion, taken by Luis Trejo, have been introduced inline, (in green), in the following slides

3. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 3 Outline: VRC aspects VRC definition Dealing with EELA-2 legacy Integrating Users Communities recruited by CLARA Getting (more) large VRCs as GISELA customers Others possible VRCs Training (standard versus customized) Role of WP6 Implications of VRC support on WP4 Collaboration with EGI and related projects Dissemination aspects Strategies to be developed Assessment of VRC’s involvement 3

4. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 4 VRC definition –No agreed definition –User communities are not (yet) presenting themselves as VRCs –VRC could be a convenient concept for interacting with all kind of User Communities –GISELA case: Let consider the DoW definition: –“A VRC can range from:  a group of researchers working together, sharing means to carry out common investigations, such as instruments, computing resources and tools,  up to large international well-structured collaborations with a long range scientific programme involving hundreds to thousands of scientists-engineers, rather advanced research methodologies and substantial distributed resources (large scientific instruments, data centres, attached technical support and also administrative and financial services). They have in common to base their research, every day more, on a so-called Virtual Research Environment (VRE) that comprises online tools, DCI systems and processes interoperating to enhance the research process.” –“GISELA inherits from EELA-2 VRCs that encompass two sorts of communities with the following characteristics:  Small User Communities, typically 1-2 Institution group(s), alone or collaborating with a few Institutions. Most of them are located in Latin America. Their use of the Infrastructure is to learn Grid technology by Grid enabling well chosen Application(s) and thus to evaluate the potential of the Grid computing model for their future research. In most cases the Grid technology knowledge has been brought by EELA and EELA-2. In the future it should pass progressively under the NGIs / EDGSs and LGI responsibility, as foreseen in the LGI model.  Large Collaborations (HEP, Life Sciences, Earth Sciences, etc.) that usually have their base in Europe or in the United States of America. The primary goal of each partner is to use e-Infrastructure to contribute, as committed, to the computing effort of the collaboration. On the other hand, these VRCs are more and more needing integrated tools (e.g. Web 2.0 based portals) that ease and improve the efficiency of their work.” –Note1: VRCs are mapped on disciplines not on countries –Note2: Specialized Support Centre (SSC), the instrument foreseen to support VRC does not exist anymore –At the end of the day, we should adopt the best definition for the GISELA interest

5. www.gisela-grid.eu Discussion on VRC definition Diego: (V)RC start form RC definition, when they use virtual means they become VRCs Fubica: Researchers working together on common goals. It becomes virtual when they are empowered by virtual means In LA, researchers that do not use virtual means in an intensive way or researchers that work isolated, a VRE (virtual research environment) can help them. BM: VRC is just a concept. Fubica: VRCs focus on research and not only on applications. BM: We already have research communities, for instance life science. Part of them uses different tools to perform their research; when they start using different platforms, they become VRCs. Fubica: VRC is 2 or more persons working together on common goals empowered by the use of a VR environment Dow definition: Shown in the previous slide Luis Trejo: I saw a consensus on to derive a simple and concise definition of VRC: I think that at the end of the discussion, the more accepted definition was a combination of 2: –Researchers working together on common goals. It becomes virtual when they are empowered by virtual means PLUS –VRC is 2 or more persons working together on common goals empowered by the use of a VR environment EQUAL –A group of researchers working together on common goals and empowered by the use of a Virtual Research Environment

6. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 6 Dealing with EELA-2 legacy Initial views (DoW) –“User Communities and Applications with a satisfactory level of engagement will be initially preferred” –“GISELA will follow the cost-effective strategy towards User Communities inherited from EELA-2” Current status –List of selected EELA-2 User communities to be made –Contact communities –Explain the new objective: mass production Discussion: The new objectives in GISELA are: –Mass production, but it is not exclusive –Give more preference to applications that are run on a continuous basis, in other words, they do not run a few times and then leave. However, here again it is a preference, not a limitation. There is general agreement on this selection procedure

7. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 7 Users Communities recruited by CLARA Current status –Community survey performed by CLARA –VRC defined via a set of selection criteria –No prejudice on actual computing needs –Set of communities selected, mainly from social sciences Issues –Identify communities that could potentially benefit from GISELA –Introduce them to Grid computing and get them started Other CLARA issues –Construction of the Business Plan dealing with VRC support –Presence of CLARA in EGI, CHAIN,.. Events –Presence of GISELA in CLARA events to discuss VRC support

8. www.gisela-grid.eu Discussion on: Integrating Users Communities recruited by CLARA PP Slide shown was considered more than perfect. Request form Diego: It would be great to have information about their proposals to better understand what they are doing and explore the possibly to offer them the use of GRID LT: Do not loose VRCs that do not meet the requirement of 5 countries. It would be desirable to contact VRCs identified by CLARA to assess their needs, without leaving out LA communities that either did not applied or did not meet CLARA´s criteria

9. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 9 Including more large VRCs Start with large VRCs “familiar” with GISELA –HEP: LHC experiments (LHCb, ALICE; CMS, ATLAS), Auger –Earth Sciences with some contacts: A.Cofino for WRF Applications, J.P.Vilotte, A.Pina –Life Sciences with some contacts: A.Bonvin (e-NMR ), V.Hernandez –1st priority with the aim of mass production –Short term strategy to be defined Include more members of the above VRCs –Medium to long term activities How to deal with ESFRI projects –Are we concerned by ESFRI projects? –Apparently no (or very few) LA partners in ESFRI projects! How to deal with e-IRG recommendations?

10. www.gisela-grid.eu Discussion on: Including more large VRCs To the question ¿How do we deal with ESFRI project? –The general answer was that we should focus on our main goals –Regarding the question if we should approach ESFRI and look for synergies with them, BM position was: –BM: If possible yes, it is desirable

11. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 11 Other possible VRCs (1) Potential VRCs from national scientific initiatives grouping domains e.g.: –Brazilian initiative (Institutos Nacionais de Ciência e Tecnologia) –Creation of “Poles of scientific excellence” (France) Discussion: Other possible VRCs –We should take into account Brazil national e-science initiative as a source of new and large VRCs; also we should consider Poles (of excellence) in France, Thematic Networks in Mexico, and so on. We rely on the local effort made by GISELA partners. A strategy made by a partner could be (more than just sending an e-mail) to try to set up a Video Conference (or skype) with key persons and leaders of these networks and WP3 leader (Diego) –Colombia: Research Centers in Bioinformatics, CIAT, Cinecafé, Research groups in Grid, Oil and gas industry, Urban air pollution, Mechanical Engineering –Universidad de la República mentioned NICCAD: Multidisciplinary Group of HPC scientific research which gathers 15 research groups in different areas like Digi- Clima, Parallel computing meta-heuristic for optimization –In Mexico, UASLP deals with Applications in Artificial Intelligence

12. www.gisela-grid.eu Other possible VRCs (2) Industry: Consider Virtual Industry Communities (VIC) e.g.: –San Luis Potosí (Mexico) industry representatives (15 people)  Contacted through the local Chamber of Commerce  Attending the KoM Industry session  Enthusiastic, motivated to interact further with GISELA Discussion on Industry –It is not a priority for the group since it seems to require a case by case analysis and a long period of development. –LT: It seems to me a little contradictory since at the TECBOR meeting we agreed to do a follow up with participants from industry at the industry@grid track in SLP.

13. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 13 Training (standard versus customised) Issues: –How to balance classical and VRC customized tutorials –Synergy with EPIKH events (Tutorials and Grid Schools) –Calendar to be defined asap –Regional events (cost effective) The conclusions of the discussion were: –Standard training should be EPIKH´s role with GISELA participation, whereas customized training a WP3-GISELA´ role with EPIKH collaboration Other ideas/conclusions: –Workshops should be coupled with EGI events and with workshops carried out by LA VRCs –LA training needs to get local resources for support given the EPIKH funding mechanism, which is only inter-continental. –One way to reduce costs is to use local trainers for local training.

14. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 14 Role of WP6 From the DOW: –“WP6 will interact with the VRCs to collaborate to the identification, development and deployment of integrated services (e.g. gateways)” Strategies –Short term:  Capitalize on EELA-2 developments Identify JRA1 services of immediate potential interest Focus on a few services as DIRAC and deploy them –Medium term:  Wait for interaction with VRCs to launch new developments Discussion: Role of WP6 Agreed

15. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 15 Implications of VRC support on WP4 VRC should be a concept useful also for the operation of the e- Infrastructure WP4 issues –Is a VRC a collection of VOs (if not what is it for WP4) ? –Only care of VOs ? –More generally: relationship between VRC VO –How many VOs are going to be supported by WP4 ? –If we stick on existing VOs (e.g. HEP VOs), how to account the actual use of the GISELA e-Infrastructure by these VOs? Discussion –VO is a collection of software, it represents the technical, administrative, and operation of the infrastructure –Accounting should be done per VO –Also consider the following situation: a site that is running 5000 CPUs, but only 100 were committed to GISELA. A possible solution would be to report the total load and also explicitly report the percentage that belongs to GISELA.

16. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 16 Collaboration with EGI & related projects From the recent EGI Forum in Amsterdam: –EGI WP on VRC support (Contact: Steve Brewer) –Brain storming session (no agreed definition of VRC) –GISELA proposal to have a common workshop “Regional Infrastructures meeting VRCs” –Preliminary decision  Have a central VRC data base à la EELA-2  Have EGI as central point for VRCs inter-communication  Short term: Keep interacting on the basis of exchange of views  Meet at the coming EGI User Forum (Vilnius, Lithuania, 11-15 April 2011) http://www.egi.eu/EGIUF2011/index.html Collaborating with CHAIN and Regional e-Infrastructures –Interact with CHAIN on the definition of its strategy model… –Decide to meet at each EGI event in the framework of the “Regional e- Infrastructures session” to discuss WP3, WP6 and WP4 matters –1 st event: CHAIN KoM (December 2010 - Roma)

17. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 17 Dissemination aspects How to get organised to reach in a coherent way: –Former EELA-2 users –CLARA User communities –Known VRCs potentially customers of GISELA –Large VRCs –Other VRCs (e.g. Scientific communities getting structured) How to present GISELA to VRCs –Meetings at the country level? –Common meetings with EGI, Regional Infrastructures,… as proposed by GISELA at the recent EGI Technical Forum? –VRC specific brochure/doc (as we did for SSCs)? Calendar of events to be defined not later than M02 Discussion –Built urgently VRC oriented Fact-Sheets, with different options depending on the target audience.

18. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 18 Strategies to be developed From the DOW: –“WP3 will interact with new VRCs to evaluate the technical requirements and impact of their Applications and to support their deployment. WP6 will contribute to the dissemination and use of the services it developed in EELA-2; –WP6 will interact with the VRCs to collaborate to the identification, development and deployment of integrated services (e.g. gateways)” Need to adopt precise strategies on the short term –Bottom up strategy  Get a.s.a.p a few VRCs running production as intensively as possible on GISELA  Aim at saturating the e-Infrastructure –Top down approach  In parallel, keep Contacting VRCs by all means Collaborating with EGI, CHAIN, other projects Refining our VRC approach Discussion: Strategies agreed

19. www.gisela-grid.eu GISELA KoM - 21-24 September 2010 - San Luis Potosí (Mexico) 19 Assessment of VRC’s involvement Fulfilment of WP3 and WP6 yearly metrics Discussion: It was mentioned that the number of self- training material metrics are a little high. Partners should participate in the development of training material.