EchoGRID Thematic Workshops focus on key grid topics defined by a team of European and Chinese experts with the aim of defining the perspectives for R&D and enterprise developments in the two regions for the future. The second EchoGRID Strategic Workshop, which took place last October, brought together high-profile players from business and research to engage in a mutually beneficial dialogue on grid developments.

Hosted by the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS) in Beijing, the Workshop explored new programming paradigms for grid infrastructures, key mechanisms that should be embedded within grid middleware, the latest scientific advances in the area of grid workflows, and the most recent user experiences in adopting several grid middleware systems, including Globus, gLite, CNGrid, CROWN and Unicore. Participants shared valuable knowledge on the work, resources and skills needed to facilitate grid development for both business and science. EchoGRID is evaluating these developments in terms of their technological validity, and industrial and societal impact, with the aim of analysing the potential and risks involved.

Experts from China brought beneficial knowledge on several fundamental changes in the programming paradigm. Bo Ding, National University of Defense (China), explained how new technologies will ease the shift towards emerging pervasive computing applications and Internet-based large-scale computing systems. Yann Radenac, an EchoGRID fellow at the Chinese Academy of Science (CAS), presented an unconventional approach to Grid programming based on an intrinsically parallel model that has several nice autonomic properties that are expected for grids.

Erica Yang, Science and Technology Facilities Council (United Kingdom), represented XtreemOS, an important European initiative to support grid computing by developing and prompting a Linux-based grid operating system. The talk gave a preview of the first release of the XtreemOS software distribution, outlining the areas of work that will be tackled in the year ahead. Jianxin Li, Beihang University, provided an informative overview of grid security and trust management within the CROWN grid project, highlighting a number of research activities relating to the project, which is funded by National Science Foundation of China. Philippe Massonet, CETIC (Belgium), outlined the goals and expected outcomes of the GridTrust Project, dedicated to developing the technology to manage trust and security for next-generation grids (NGG). The main outcomes will be a framework for the trust, security and privacy properties for various kinds of virtual organizations.

Rubao Li, ICT, CAS, introduced a novel data sharing solution for concurrent distributed queries, called the Request Window Mechanism. The talk looked into the IGNITE (Information Grid with New InTelligent Engine) system, an information grid middleware based on PostgreSQL, showing the throughput speed-up when enabling request window for running distributed TPC-H workloads.

The presentation by Jianjun Yu from e-Science Application Research Centre (CAS) explained the rationale and benefits of e-Science technology with particular reference to initiatives at the Chinese Academy, such as e-Science Virtual Laboratory (VLAB) projects, an example of how e-science technology development will bring about a next-generation cyber infrastructure for global and distributed scientific collaboration and research.

EGEE-II, the world’s largest multi-science grid infrastructure, has proven to be a valuable asset for a wide range of scientific domains and is increasingly attracting interest from numerous businesses sectors. The EGEE project could be a key enabler of businesses, as a service that can be used as a virtual computing center, a means of selling their services and products, or as an example of how to build partner grids with their supply chains. Gabriel Zaquine from the EGEE Industry Task Force highlighted the key features of EGEE’s production quality middleware, offering case studies on the early industrial adoption of gLite, with a focus on benefits for SMEs. Examples include grid on-demand and collaborative grid for smaller firms operating in the plastic industry and in oil and gas. Seismic processing (CGG Veritas) is one of the BEinGrid Business Experiments (BE18) that adopts gLite, in addition to EGEODE and the NICE Enginframe. The aim is both to solve complex problems and verify the economic viability with particular reference to the large number of SMEs operating in oil and gas.

The GriFin (Grid & Finance) project was presented by Giulio Galiero, Engineering (Italy). GriFin aims to build a problem-solving environment (PSE) for the financial market based on a grid infrastructure. Galiero evaluated the main features of grid adoption in the financial services sector, especially top-level industry challenges. The talk included a case study from the project and outlined initial findings with particular reference to security and middleware architecture. Professor Thomas Fahringer, Innsbruck University, illustrated how grid developers can meet the needs of industry applications and push the technology in new directions. Examples were given from the gaming industry, which has a huge market potential, illustrating key features of the Edutain@grid project, which aims to create a new breed of computer game with real-time computation and communication.

The Workshop also looked at grid workflows. Fahringer focused his talk on advanced services for scientific workflows, citing the example of the ASKALON grid application development and computing environment, which aims to provide an invisible grid for application users and developers with enhanced data flow and multi-parameter optimization for a variety of quality of service (QoS) parameters. Zhang Liyong, CAS, gave an overview of a concept model that virtualizes legacy workflow applications and enactment engines as abstract services that can be further used to create applications on a business level. The development of grid workflow systems forms part of activities undertaken within CNGrid with the aim of enabling dynamic collaboration and problem solving across boundaries.

Insight into emerging composite workflows requiring specialised systems to deal with heterogeneous and distributed environments like the grid was provided by Dimosthenis Kyriazis, National Technical University of Athens (Greece). The talk detailed an approach for service selection using QoS criteria, such as a workflow and SLA mapping, term-checking services and decision support components. Not only will these features match user needs, they will also maximise benefits in terms of the QoS level offered.

The input of EchoGRID workshops will contribute to a roadmap developing a shared China-Europe vision of future grid research perspectives for both the research and business communities over the short- to long-term, establishing a priority-based framework and clear agenda for future co-operation.

About EchoGRID

EchoGRID (http://echogrid.ercim.org/), an EC-funded project for European and Chinese cooperation on grid, is coordinated by ERCIM and partnered by EU and Chinese businesses and high-profile research institutions. The project will develop a collaboration roadmap identifying common areas of interest and opportunities, promoting cross-fertilization between grid-related projects and initiatives in both regions by interacting with grid research and business communities. An important goal of the project is the exchange of experiences and best practices by selecting grid open standards for middleware and application interoperability and fostering the identification of guidelines for a standard quality assurance process.