What are potential applications to exploit the GlobusToolkit / Unicore installation at RRZE?

Although there are still some difficulties in getting the GlobusToolkit installation running, I’m wodering who will use it.

The GlobusToolkit is basically just a framework. Therefore, users probably have to spend some effort to make their applications GT4-aware … Just using GSIftp or SGIssh probably is not a big progress …

With Unicore, the situation might be slightly better as there is a nice GUI. However, also this GUI has to be extended by plugins written in Java to realy make progress. Just using the shell plugin does not really help. But at least, the Unicore client can easily be installed on the user’s system without requiering as host certificate or installing many hunderds MB as it is the case for GT4.

But anyway, my (current) feeling is that all grid services will have the same future as advanced debugger: ssh/slogin/scp will remain the tool of choise as printf will remain the most popular "debugger". But I’d be gladed to be convinced otherwise (by practial examples).

mutt and smime (encryption/signing)
After receiving my Grid certificate I just wanted to use this certificate for signing or encrypting mails. With Thunderbird this is no problem – just include it into your keystore. However, with my favorite mail tool “mutt” I did not yet manage to get the complete certificate chain in 🙂

Keystore with complete certificate chain required:

once the complete certificate chain is available in the keystore, smime_keys add_p12 KEYSTORE works fine. Check
http://www.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/dienste/arbeiten-rechnen/hpc/grid/zertifikate.shtml for a detailed description on how to create a keystore with complete certificate chain.

However, you still need to add the CA certs with smime_keys add_root PCA.pem and smime_keys add_root UserCA.pem before add_p12 succeeds.

Further references:

• http://wiki.austriangrid.at/index.php/Certificate_installation_in_mutt
• http://kb.wisc.edu/middleware/page.php?id=4091
• and a little patch to make smime_keys work with certain mutt versions: http://launchpadlibrarian.net/20204370/smime_keys-1.5.17%2B20080114-1ubuntu1.diff

RRZE will soon become a GRID-RA within the DFN-PKI …

Once all organisatorial requirements are fullfiled at RRZE, the “personal identification” for user/server certificates according to the EUGridPMA standard can then be obtained at the HPC-Group of RRZE for O=GridGermany/ OU=Universitaet Erlangen-Nuernberg.

Further details will be announced once all details have been negogiated with DFN – hopefully not later than by the end of March.

GRID-RA@RRZE in beta test: After many organizatorial efforts, the GRID-RA@RRZE reached its beta test. See http://www.rrze.uni-erlangen.de/dienste/arbeiten-rechnen/hpc/grid/ for details about the proceedure for obtaining a certificat. If there are any questions, just contact me.

We are still working on the upgrade of our grid gateway! GT2.4 is no longer available. The installation of GT4 is not yet finished. That effectively means, RRZE currently does not have a working grid gateway right now. Please be patient! GT4 will probably not be available before end of March.

… but as emails from other (larger German) sites show, we are not the onlyones who do not have a running GT4 installation yet …

Availability of GT4 at RRZE will depend on the support and detailed getting-started instructions (in particular integration of GT4 and PBS) from LRZ who is responsible for the Globus Toolkit within D-Grid.

RRZE is an “associated partner” in the D-GRID project MediGRID and participates as “resource provider”.