1. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 1 Visual Grid Tutorial PI: Dr. Bina Ramamurthy Computer Science and Engineering Dept. Graduate Student: Surabhi Abhayankar Undergraduate Student: Min Suk Cha This project is partially supported by Educational Technology Grant of University at Buffalo and NSF DUE CCLI A&I 0311473

2. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 2 Introduction: Grid Computing Grid computing offers an open and standard framework for integrating resources and computations across distributed, heterogeneous and dynamic organizations. It is an emerging technology that is expected to provide scalable solutions for a wide range complex scientific problems. –Examples: drug discovery, advanced weather prediction models; modeling spreading of avian flu; financial portfolio management; space applications

3. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 3 Problem Addressed While the grid can solve a wide range of problems, lack of a proper learning tool is hiding its real worth and impairing its growth and application. To address these problems, we have designed and implemented a Visual Grid Tutorial (ViGOR) tool to disseminate to grid concepts and application models.

4. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 4 ViGOR Tool We have designed a tool that grid concepts at three levels of detail: 1.Executive Summary High level information 2.Basic Concepts Architectural details and building blocks enabling a grid 3.Grid Programming Programming models with optional code details

5. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 5 Tool Screen Shot

6. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 6 Discussion Topics Design of ViGOR Implementation Details Grid Computing Concepts Illustrated Usage Models Broader Impact of ViGOR Summary References Demo

7. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 7 Design Details Fully animated visual tour of the concepts presented at three levels: –Executive or policy maker –Grid user –Grid programmer There levels will be presented embedded within each other and one can easily navigate among the three

8. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 8 Implementation Details Vector graphics offered by Flash and the related e-learning support offered by Macromedia worked in favor of choosing Flash as the basic medium for development of ViGOR. Moreover, it provides more slick and portable outputs. ViGOR has been developed as a stand alone, web-accessible tool.

9. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 9 Grid Computing Concepts Different types of grid Core services offered by the grid –soft-state management, notification, service data, routing, logging and virtualization System level services –Security and job execution Higher level services –Storage services, information services and resource framework Application models Programming models

10. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 10 Usage Models Level 1 (Executive summary level) can be used to publicize the grid technology to any audience from high school students to corporate policy makers and novices to grid. Level 2 (Grid user level) will teach users how to use a grid for problem solving in their domain. Level 3 (Grid programmer level) will expose programming models and code details. Used in all distributed systems courses. (CSE4/586)

11. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 11 Broader Impact Provide a healthy support for the growth of the grid. Provide many inquiring minds a visual tour of the grid technology. Offer an appealing façade to motivate undergraduates and visual learners to explore the grid. Adaptable, independent, and easily accessible. Framework for collaboration among grid computing specialists and domain experts.

12. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 12 Summary ViGOR is a unique project that will explicitly showcase the grid technology. Learning tool ViGOR will complement the grid curriculum effort that is underway at UB and elsewhere. We plan to leverage ViGOR effort to seek external funding for expansion of ViGOR.

13. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 13 Future: ViGOR Version 2 Add more content: grid computing area is vast Improve visual appeal: current version is still textual Evaluate the usefulness of the tool

14. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 14 References http://www.globus.org –Grid related information http://www.macromedia.com –Macromedia Flash and e-learning suite of software and some sample projects http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/gridforce –PI’s NSF-supported grid curriculum project to improve the technical preparedness of our workforce for the grid. The project is called Grid For Collaboration, Research and Education (GridFoRCE)

15. 4/27/2006Education Technology Presentation 2006 15 ViGOR1.0 ViGOR1.2