OGF21 - Software Forum - Panel Discussion

For OGF21 it is planned to have again a software forum where software developers present their current work. In addition it is planned to have a panel discussion where questions can be asked to the software developers. The mode will likely to be the following. In an introduction to the panel someone from the GIN-CG will outline the idea of the panel and explain a set of questions prepared and sent to the software developers in advance. The software developers will then get a little time to address each of the questions. Finally, in a general discussion there will be time for other questions as well as statements from the community.

The GIN-CG has been asked to suggest a list of software developers and prepare a set of key questions to be asked to the software developers. The following represents the outcome of the second GIN Session at OGF20 in Manchester:

Which software developers would you like to see in that panel?

Confirmed panelists

Session takes place Thursday, 1:30pm - 3pm, Portland

Questions to be asked to the software developers

Key Questions

• From your perspective, what are the key (proposed) standards which you think will allow interoperability in the mid term?
• What are your plans of supporting these?
• Which is in your opinion the area which lacks standardization most (either because of the absence of standardization or because of insufficient standards)?
  

Standards

• Which (future) standards are seen as important?
• How close is your implementation to the (published) standard(s)?
• Which are the proprietary extenstions to employed standards you had to make and why?
• In case you omitted parts of a standard for you implementation, what parts did you omit and why?
  
  

Interoperation

The Grid infrastructure projects currently identify the fields with main obstacles for interoperation as

• how to achieve interoperability
• is there a common subset
• is there a standardization effort on your roadmap
• is there convergance of the roadmaps
• how can we influence the roadmaps

• Authentication and authorization due to the different methods and policy management X.509; X.509 proxies; SAML; XACML, uname/password

• Access to storage SRM, SRB, gridFTP, http databases

• Access to compute resources GT2, GT4, Condor, ARC, UNICORE, LCG-CE, (portals and metaschedulers) (HPCP-prototypes, CREAM, ...)

• Service discovery MDS-4, MDS-2, bdII, UDII, ldap-based systems

• information schema glue, MDS-schema, CIM, NorduGrid-schema

• User documentation (configuration, arguments, performance)

Obviously, the identified areas cover all inter-site aspects of Grid computing. Hence,

• What do you suggest are the best ways to tackle these problem areas?
• Do you have a different opinion on the choice of areas? Do you see an area which is missing for whatever reason?

Further questions which could be asked

• Roadmap document
• What is your funding status in a mid- and long-term perspective?