OSG User Support Strategies March 24, 2015 OSG All Hands @ Northwestern University Rob Gardner University of Chicago Mats Rynge ISI, University of Southern California
OSG User Support: in transition ● For the past three years User Support has been led by Chander Sehgal ○ This has been the umbrella for OSG-XD, OSG-Direct as well as VO-level engagements ● User Support transitioned two weeks ago to: ○ Production analysis & VO support: (Bo Jayatilaka) ○ Campus researchers + User support: (Rob Gardner) ○ Just getting started... ● We thank Chander for his energy & vision!
Combined campus grids + user support ● Campus researchers, XSEDE users, campus grids under one umbrella ● Led by Rob Gardner ● Team: ○ Bala Desinghu (1.0) - University of Chicago ○ Emelie Harstad (0.5) - University of Nebraska ○ Mats Rynge (0.5) - ISI/USC ○ Suchandra Thapa (0.5) - University of Chicago ○ David Champion (0.5) - University of Chicago
Components of user support ● Single point of contact for OSG “users” and potential resource providers ○ e.g. “the front door to the OSG” ○ Assess fit of incoming customers ■ A new virtual organization → OSG Production & VO support ■ A new OSG site → OSG Operations ■ A new campus researcher → OSG User Support ■ A new campus resource provider or campus CI connection → OSG Campus Grids
Components of user support, cont. ● User support “on-ramps” ○ OSG Connect ○ OSG XD ○ OSG Direct (legacy → new users go to OSG Connect) ● Campus client ○ Lightweight connector to OSG Connect from campus ○ c.f. talk by D. Champion ● End user supported submit hosts (schedds) ■ Possibly outside the scope of user support?
Technical components ● Scientific software, libraries, and tools ○ We offer a service to install software into OASIS and provide validation on said software on the OSG using Distributed Environment Modules ● Transient storage service (Stash) ● Storage caching service (StashCache) - future
Scientific software support ● OASIS+Modules = Distributed $ switchmodules oasis Environment (CVMFS) Modules $ module avail $ module load R https://confluence.grid.iu.edu/display/CON/Distributed+Environment+Modules $ module load namd $ module purge s r e t s u l $ switchmodules local c E D E S X & G S O s s o Common tools & libs ● r c a t n Curate apps on ● e m n o r demand v i n e n DHTC-suited apps in ● o i t a c i l XSEDE campus yum p p a n o repo m m o c ● Usage tracked by user, project & site
User Training and Support ● The biggest challenge is for users making the jump from local to national which can involve ○ web → Unix ○ pbs/slurm → condor ○ local cluster → distributed cluster ● Training efforts to date ○ OSG ConnectBook ○ OSG XSEDE user guide ○ Software development training with Software Carpentry
SWC-OSG Workshops ● Combine core Unix, python, git lessons from SWC with distributed high throughput computing from OSG ● Two workshops to date: ○ March 3-6, 2015 @ IUPUI: http://goo.gl/dveKYE ○ December 15-17, 2012 @ UC: http://goo.gl/acFXQX ● Let us know if you’d like one scheduled at your university
Scientific Computing Consultation A new user may not know how to apply DHTC to their research. We provide scientific consultation to users by ● Email queries (on-going effort) ● Phone conversations (on-going effort) ● Office hours via phone or IM (yet to be started)
XD / XSEDE OSG is an XSEDE service provider Users have to write allocation proposals, which are then peer reviewed 2 million core hours quarterly Benefits: Allocated hours have higher priority Visibility and Discovery Users can keep using the resource after allocated hours are used up, but at standard opportunistic priority Education and outreach Campus Champions Allocations are active for 1 year, then have to submit a new proposal Domain Champions
ACI-REF + OSG Partnership ● ACI-REF (Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Research & Education Facilitators) ○ http://www.aciref.org/ ● Providing training and support to ACI-REFs to use OSG Connect ● Raise awareness of OSG as national resource available to local researchers (like XSEDE, etc)
OSG on Campus: template campaign? ● Create presence on campus websites ● “National resources” ○ typically see XSEDE, plus campus champions, DOE, etc. ○ Add a snippet for Open Science Grid with getting started link
OSG on Campus: template campaign? ● Create presence on campus websites ● “National resources” ○ typically see XSEDE, plus campus champions, DOE, etc. ○ Add a snippet for Open Open Science Grid Cornell is partnering with the OSG to provide additional Science Grid with getting computational cycles for high throughput computing. To use OSG, start here . started link
Conclusions ● Just getting started with the new organization so will be working out kinks in the coming months ● Important partnerships: ○ ACI-REF, XSEDE campus champions and domain champions, campus HPC centers & local support staff ● Two things coming soon ○ Making front door more inviting and clear (discussions this week) Helpdesk service for knowledge base, campus and user issue “tracking”, ○ community forums
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