EUROGRID - European Testbed for GRID Applications

Computational GRIDs are increasingly becoming a cornerstone of highperformance computing research and infrastructure. In the worldwide computer science community the benefits of GRID technology have been amply demonstrated, and GRID systems are being phased into daily use at universities and research centres, for instance for remote experiments in material sciences, biology and astrophysics.

However, the uptake of GRID technology in the broad community of scientists that depend on computational simulation techniques has yet to happen, and industrial endusers are lagging even farther behind. The EUROGRID project demonstrates the use of GRIDs in four selected scientific and industrial communities, addresses their specific requirements in a European GRID middleware, and highlights the benefits of using GRIDs. The choice of communities ensures that the results can be transferred to a broad range of potential users.
BioGRID,Scientists working in biomolecular research regularly use a set of established simulation and visualization packages and associated molecule databases. Their daily work is complicated by incompatibilities between packages, substantial differences in user interfaces and the need to become familiar with the highperformance execution systems. In particular, nonexperts in computer science face a steep learning curve before they can become productive. In BioGRID intuitive user interfaces for selected biomolecular packages and compatibility interfaces for their databases are being developed. The result will be an integrated biomolecular toolkit allowing streamlined work processes and access to all systems in the BIOGRID with a uniform and intuitive user interface.
MeteoGRID,Making effective use of todays supercomputer platforms for short and mediumrange weather predictions is quite a mature field: precise weather forecasts are readily available, yet they are limited in spatial precision and in the modelling of microclimate effects. For many scenarios, exact meso or microscale predictions are required: agriculture, pollution prediction, traffic and public event planning all depend on accurate localized weather data. To accommodate these, a flexible framework for ondemand localized weather prediction is being developed in EUROGRID: from a request issued on a workstation somewhere on the Internet, a run of a special local weather model is scheduled based on regular forecast data, and the result data is automatically transferred to the customer. The EUROGRID middleware takes care of transporting requests and results, and runs the local forecast on a suitable system in the MeteoGRID.
CAEGRID,The use of CAE simulation packages has become standard practice amongst engineers in many industrial sectors: automotive, aerospace, electronics etc. These users often require more computing power than is available within their organizations, forcing jobs to be run at external computing centres, or internal computing resources to be combined. EUROGRID demonstrates the benefits of GRID technology in two key areas: code coupling and ASP services.,The coupling of multiple CAE codes (each one simulating a different aspect) is emerging as a key technology to accelerate design, construction and verification of complex systems. A general mechanism for the coupling of simulation applications is being integrated into the EUROGRID system, and its use is being demonstrated with realworld aerospace applications.,Many industrial companies, in particular small and medium enterprises, lack inhouse access to sufficiently powerful computing systems, yet are increasingly depending on CAE systems and simulation packages. For them, the ASP (application service provider) scheme offers an attractive solution: an external provider of computing power runs their jobs and bills them according to the resources actually used. Key issues are the confidentiality and security of input and output data, assured availability of services, accuracy of billing and the use of standard access methods that do not require special equipment at the customer sites. Within EUROGRID accounting and billing functions are being integrated into the EUROGRID system, and an ASP system for important CAE packages will be demonstrated in the CAEGRID.
HPCGRID,The participating HPC centres have established a transEuropean computational GRID for their users, making available part of their local resources for the EUROGRID users in science and industry.,This GRID serves as a testbed for the development of distributed applications, the integration of full production systems in a GRID environment, and for the close cooperation between sites operating a wide range of different HPC platforms. Focus is on the application domains not represented in the domainspecific activities discussed above. The distributed applications that will have the biggest added value for scientific research are those concerned with multiphysics simulations relying on complex computational workflows. These demand the coherent and complementary use of different computational resources, and map very naturally to a heterogeneous GRID environment.
EUROGRID Software,EUROGRID relies on a proven GRID system originally developed in the German UNICORE Plus project. It consists of three distinct software tiers: a Client the user interacts with to construct, submit and control the execution of computational jobs, a Gateway acting as single pointofentry into the protected domains of the supercomputing centres, and a Server that schedules and executes the jobs on the local highperformance platforms. All components are written in Java, and the protocols between the components are defined using Java mechanisms.,The system emphasizes strong authentication and data security and relies on X.509 certificates and SSL. The server uses platformspecific Incarnation Databases to translates the abstract jobs as defined by the enduser to concrete command sequences for the actual execution system.
,Within EUROGRID, functional extensions as required by the four application GRIDs discussed are being developed and integrated into the EUROGRID system:,· Highperformance data transfer: integrate thirdparty transfer mechanisms and allow for overlapping of data transfer and processing.,· Dynamic resource discovery and brokering: identify available resources that match criteria specified by the enduser and broker for bestcase execution according to a variety of metrics (cost, timetocompletion, reliability).,· Accounting and billing services: in an ASP setting, keep track of resource usage and handle invoices/payment in a secure manner.,· Application coupling: accommodate proven techniques for the coupling of simulation applications (Corba, MpCCI, ...).· Interactive access and application steering: allow for interactive use of resources (shell commands) and demonstrate the integration of application steering mechanisms.
Status,Recently the EUROGRID project was presented with demonstrations at the SC2002 (Baltimore, Maryland, USA; 16-22 November 2002) and the IST2002 (Copenhagen, Denmark; 4-6 November 2002).
The SC2002 conference and exhibition was a record-breaking success that attracted approximately 7,200 participants to the technical program sessions and exhibit floor, nearly 2,000 more than last year. Moreover, the conference featured a record-breaking 223 exhibitors (99 of which were Research Exhibitors) covering nearly two acres of exhibit floor display area. (http://www.sc2002.org)
IST 2002 was a conference and a 4500 m² exhibition. Its main purpose was to build-up the community of researchers in IT and communications disciplines, looking to respond to the EU's Sixth Framework Programme for Research and Development (FP6), which is to be launched at the end of 2002. (http://2002.istevent.cec.eu.int/)
The presentation of the EUROGRID project at both exhibitions covered the impressive progress to the user interfaces of the Bio-Grid like Gaussian Plugin and PDB Search Utility, as well as the latest results in the technology development namely interactive access and resource brokering.
To demonstrate the easiness in building an entire Grid based on the Unicore software a complete Grid system was installed at the start of the exhibition on several boothes of the SC2002 showfloor.
In the first two years, the EUROGRID project has clearly demonstrated the viability of transnational GRIDs in the four chosen application domains and the benefits to endusers: access to a broader range of computing resources, ability to run larger or more resourceconsuming workflows, and increased flexibility in choosing platforms. Development of domainspecific extensions has progressed very well, with plugins for important applications (Gaussian, CPMD, Molpro, Gromos etc.) emerging as the key element for increasing acceptance of GRIDs and user productivity. An application plugin will typically present a friendly interface for running that application to a scientific enduser, hiding system and GRID details and communicating with the enduser at an appropriate level of abstraction. EUROGRID has introduced a powerful mechanism for coding these plugins in Java and integrating them into the client. An advanced plugin for driving the ondemand localized weather prediction and is nearing completion, as is a plugin for seamless integration of Corbabased application coupling.
In the current version of EUROGRID, data transfer has been enhanced with the integration of GidFTP, and the provision of FIFO files that will allow realtime data processing. A resource broker component will become operational end of 2002, and the first implementation of interactive access allows the execution of selected shell commands and the steering of applications based on input streams.
The source code of the base EUROGRID system and of many extensions is available under an Open Source license from http://www.unicore.org/downloads.htm.
The next opportunity to see demonstrations of the EUROGRID software is the first EUROGRID Workshop which will be held prior to the Euroweb 2002 Conference at St Anne's College Oxford, UK, December 16, 2002. The Euroweb 2002 Conference with the conference theme The Web and the GRID: from e-science to e-business will take place on December 17-18, 2002. The workshop will be public and is open to all Euroweb 2002 participants.
HansChristian Hoppe, Pallas GmbH,Daniel Mallmann, Forschungszentrum Jülich,December 2002,([e-mail], ,[e-mail])

HansChristian Hoppe:,Diploma in computer science from the University of Bonn,19891994: GMD, working on communication libraries for shared and distributedmemory computers (PARMACS).,1994now: Pallas GmbH, working in the design and implementation of messagepassing libraries (MPI), and in the development of parallel performance tools and libraries (Vampir, Vampirtrace), as well as in the design and development of GRID portal systems. He is currently coordinating Pallas UNICORE and EUROGRID efforts, and has been involved in several fourth- and fifth-framework projects (FITS, SEPTools, METODIS, INTONE), performing both technical and coordination tasks.
Daniel Mallmann:,Diploma in Electrical Engineering (Technical Computer Science) from the Aachen University of Technology (RWTH),1993-1997: computer application consultant (freelancer),1997-now: scientific assistant of the Research Centre Juelich GmbH, working on the topics scheduling, computing environments and Grid computing, performing technical and coordination tasks.,

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