ACADEMIA

EDINBURGH, SCOTLAND -- Platform Computing, a leader in distributed and Grid computing software solutions, announced that Sandia National Laboratories has selected Platform Globus 2.0 in the industry’s first commercial end-user adoption of the Globus Toolkit?. Sandia will use Platform Globus for the ASCI (Accelerated Strategic Computing Initiative) Grid, which securely connects three U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Labs, including Sandia National Labs (Albuquerque, NM), Lawrence Livermore National Lab (Livermore, CA) and Los Alamos National Lab (Los Alamos, NM), in the world’s largest Grid. “Platform Globus offers us numerous benefits, such as multi-platform commercial technical support, quality assurance and cost effectiveness,” said Steven Humphreys, ASCI Grid Services Project Leader, Sandia National Labs. “We made initial steps in hardening the Globus Toolkit for use with Kerberos, and are now collaborating with Platform to enhance the initial integration. Kerberos support allows us compliance with our approved security framework, and the opportunity to leverage our in-house Kerberos expertise.” The ASCI Grid enables scientists and engineers to access massively parallel supercomputers for collaborative modeling and simulation work. Based on the June 2002 Top 500 Supercomputer List, the ASCI Grid connects the second, sixth, seventh and 15th fastest computers in the world. These supercomputers include, respectively: ASCI White at LLNL (IBM RS/6000 SP); ASCI Red at Sandia (Intel-based); and ASCI Blue Mountain and Q at LANL (HP AlphaServer SC and SGI® Origin®). Platform Globus will interface with multiple cluster-level workload managers, including Platform LSF, PBS, NQS and DPCS in this Grid. “Sandia’s adoption of Platform Globus for the ASCI Grid is a significant milestone for the Globus Toolkit, clearly demonstrating the evolution of Grid computing from Enterprise Grids to Partner Grids. As a leading-edge adopter of Partner Grids, Sandia has moved swiftly to address the challenges in information security,” said Rene’ Copeland, vice president, sales, government and life sciences, Platform. “Their innovation and ongoing collaboration with Platform will allow us to advance commercial Grid computing through the Globus Toolkit.” Security was a primary challenge that these three labs needed to address in establishing the ASCI Grid. Kerberos is one of the components being utilized to meet the requirements of these geographically distributed organizations. As part of the ASCI program, Sandia modified an earlier version of the Globus Toolkit to use Kerberos security and has now contributed these modifications back to the Globus Toolkit, as well as releasing this software and other capabilities built on top of Globus under an open source license. Platform Globus 2.0 is the industry’s first commercially supported version of the open source Globus Toolkit, which has emerged as an important technology for Grid computing. With Platform Globus, partner organizations can establish Partner Grids across multiple heterogeneous hardware and software platforms to share compute resources across geographic sites. Through the Platform Globus Beta Program, which started in February 2002 and is completed with the successful release of Platform Globus 2.0, deployment has begun with organizations in Canada, France, South Korea, Israel, the U.S. and the U.K. “As the only platform-independent provider of a commercially supported distribution of the Globus Toolkit, Platform Computing is playing a key role in the evolution of Grid computing,” said Ian Foster, Globus Project co-lead and Associate Director of the Mathematics and Computer Science Division of Argonne National Laboratory and Professor of Computer Science at the University of Chicago. “Platform’s collaboration with Sandia is a significant event in the history of the Globus Project in that it demonstrates commercial acceptance of an open source technology for Grid computing. Platform continues to hold a significant presence as a leading provider of Grid solutions, and remains a supportive partner for the emerging Open Grid Services Architecture (OGSA) that will form the basis for Globus Toolkit version 3.0.” Platform Globus 2.0 includes the Globus Toolkit software, documentation and technical support, and a range of comprehensive professional services, including installation, configuration, customization and training. Platform works closely with the Globus Project to perform quality assurance, improve documentation, and achieve interoperability and seamless integration with commercial workload management and Grid computing applications. Platform also shares source code changes from the porting process with the Globus Project. Platform’s solutions are being used to build Enterprise and Partner Grid solutions with some of the world’s most innovative enterprises and support all major Linux, Macintosh, Unix and Windows platforms. Platform’s Enterprise Grid computing solutions include LSF, MultiCluster, ActiveCluster, Parallel, JobScheduler, File Transfer Agent (FTA), and Analyzer. For Partner Grids, an extension of Enterprise Grids that enable transparent, secure and coordinated resource sharing and collaboration among partner organizations, Platform provides Platform Globus.