UNICORE Grid Computing for Research and Science

Munich 13 January 2003 Dietmar Erwin, Head of the Department Operating Systems, Central Institute for Applied Mathematics (ZAM), Research Centre Jülich, presented the actual status and the real life experiences gained in the UNICORE grid project.

Research in Germany has access to high-performance computers, scalar, vector, MPP, clusters from different vendors with a broad spectrum of software and competence in the centres. But the users are heavily fighting with incompatible system software, different data management, administration, naming conventions and security systems in the different centres. This results in a big effort when moving from one system to another. Thus, the users access their usual system, not the best fitted. The resources are used sub-optimal and solvable problems are not solved.

The UNICORE project, partly funded by the German Ministry of Research, developed software for a seamless, secure and intuitive access to distributed HPC resources, before the grid was invented. Dietmar Erwin mentioned five computing models, Ian Foster and Carl Kesselmann defined in their book:

Distributed Computing - synchronous processing
High-Throughput Computing - asynchronous processing
On-Demand Computing - dynamic resources
Data-Intensive Computing - databases
Collaborative Computing - scientists

The UNICORE properties are:

interactive, platform-independent production and control of complex, distributed jobs
broad spectrum of functions and integration of important applications
system and centre transparency
integrated security
protecting the autonomy of the centres.

The user defines his job with applications, data transfers, interdependencies, and resources requirements. The UNICORE client produces a system-independent, abstract representation (Java, XML). The user submits the job to the wanted target computing system. The user and the client supervise the job. The UNICORE server translates the abstract job in concrete tasks for the target system, synchronises the different tasks, supervises the execution, transfers files between the centres, and transfers the results and status information to the client. On the security side UNICORE uses X.509 certificates for:

authentication of users (single-sign on)
signing of the jobs ( securing it against falsification)
authentication of clients and servers
communication via SSL (secure socket layer) - encryption of the communication via the internet
UNICORE supports firewalls

UNICORE can be integrated into the technical and administrative structure of the centres. Thus it supports the present system and application software as well as the grown file organisation. UNICORE maps onto present user accounts. The centres decide, to which virtual organisation they want to belong and who can use which resources. Actually UNICORE runs at different German supercomputer centres and supports different vendors and interacts with different batch systems. It is installed at Leibnizrechenzentrum, Munich, Hitachi SR8000, Fujitsu Siemens Computers VPP, Linux Cluster, in the Höchstleistungsrechenzentrum Stuttgart, NEC SX-series and Linux Clusters, Research Center Jülich, Cray T3Es, Cray SV1, Linux Cluster, ZIB, Konrad Zuse Institute Berlin, Cray T3E, Sun, German Weather Service, Offenbach, IBM SP, SGI, Computer Center Karlsruhe, IBM SP, PC2, Paderborn, Linux Cluster, Pallas, Sun, Fujitsu, VPP, Sun.

Pallas GmbH, Brühl, maintains anf further develops UNICORE, which is used in the projects Eurogrid, GRIP and OpenMolGrid. It is available as open source for research.

Dietmar Erwin concluded that UNICORE is a Grid Computing Environment for the German HPC centres. Now Grid Computing is more than a buzzword but realises scientific progress. But standards are needed, the Global Grid Forum is just actively working in them. Then the co-operation with industry has to be funded. The visions for 2010 have to be developed today.

http://www.unicore.org

Uwe Harms

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