Changes between Initial Version and Version 1 of InstrumentationTools-2Q09-status

Timestamp:

05/26/10 10:04:02 (14 years ago)

Author:

jtaylor@bbn.com

Comment:

--

InstrumentationTools-2Q09-status

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+[[PageOutline]]
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+= InstrumentationTools Project Status Report = 
+
+Period: 2Q09
+== I. Major accomplishments ==
+
+=== A. Milestones achieved ===
+During the past quarter we made continued progress toward our milestones. In summary we:
+  * continued to improve the aggregate reference implementation running at Kentucky.
+  * continue to work with Utah and members of the security team regarding security issues in the design of our aggregate and measurement system.
+  * have begun to design an instrumentation/measurement model that can be integrated with the Proto-GENI architecture.
+
+=== B. Deliverables made ===
+None yet. 
+
+== II. Description of work performed during last quarter ==
+
+=== A. Activities and findings ===
+This quarter we began building on the (evolving) ProtoGENI aggregate system that we installed in the
+previous quarter. In particular, we spent a good deal of our time getting familiar with the new system,
+its architecture, and the new software that drives it. As part of this effort, we have begun to develop test
+scripts that make use of the ProtoGENI interface (API) to reserve resources and create experiments. Not
+only has this helped us better understand the API, RSPECs, and the overall system architecture, but it has
+help us uncover some issues with the ProtoGENI design that were going to make it difficult for us to build
+an instrumentation system. In particular, we found that the current RSPEC approach did not include the
+information we needed to be able to monitor links in the topology, and, more generally, the information that
+is assigned at the time that resources are allocated and redeemed. We raisied these issues with the Utah team
+and had various discussions about how to handle these issues. The solution that the Utah group has decided
+to use is to redesign the RSPECs to include a “manifest” that provides the additional information we need.
+
+Given a better understanding of the ProtoGENI architecture, we have been developing an instrumenation
+architecture that will incorporate the Edulab’s measurment capabilities into the ProtoGENI system. Our new
+approach is different from our original design in that we intend to deploy experiment-specific measurement
+infrastructure in the form of measurement controller nodes that monitor an experiment’s behavior across the
+various aggregates that comprise the experiment. Not only are experiment measurement results kept private
+to the experiment, but it distributes the monitoring load across multiple nodes so the monitoring system
+can scale up as the measurement workload increases. An initial version of our instrumentation design was
+presented by Jim Griffioen at the GENIMeasurement Workshop at the University of Wisconsin. Slides from
+the talk can be found at http://groups.geni.net/geni/wiki/GENIMeasWS. Another important issue that we
+are trying to resolve is how visible the measurement system should be to users. Our current thinking is that
+the measurement infrastructure should be as invisible as possible, only making the results of measurement
+available to users and giving them the ability to control which measurement results they want to see.
+
+In the process of becoming familiar with the ProtoGENI system and developing an instrumentation
+system for it, we ran into issues related to authenticating users and services between nodes; in particular,
+between our measurement system resources and the resources being measured. We have had multiple conversations
+with the Utah team and have discussed these issues with other members of Cluster C–including
+members of the security team–working with them to come up with security solutions (and a general security
+framework) that will be useful to all members of the cluster. As of yet, the security/access model has not
+been finalized, and we continue to discuss various alternatives.
+
+In addition to planning measurement additions to our aggregate, the ProtoGENI team has been making
+continuous improvements to the code base which we have been applying regularly and then testing to make
+sure our scripts continue to run with the newly updated system. We have also done some limited testing
+across aggregates to verify that it works as expected and to become familiar with allocating resources across
+aggregates.
+=== B. Project participants ===
+The following individuals have helped with the project in one way or another during the last quarter:
+  * Jim Griffioen - Project PI
+  * Zongming Fei - Project Co-PI
+  * Hussamuddin Nasir - The project’s primary technician and programmer
+  * Lowell Pike - Network administrator
+  * Woody Marvel - Assists in Emulab administration
+=== C. Publications (individual and organizational) ===
+James Griffioen and Zongming Fei, Automatic Creation of Experiment-specific Measurement Infrastructure,
+In the proceedings of the First Workshop on Performance Evaluation of Next-Generation Networks (Neteval
+’09), Boston MA, April 2009
+=== D. Outreach activities ===
+We participated in the recent GENI Measurement conference and also gave a talk about our work at the
+Neteval ’09 conference.
+=== E. Collaborations ===
+Most of our collaborations continue to be with the Utah ProtoGENI team, and we continue to be actively
+involved in the bi-weekly meetings of the ProtoGENI cluster (Cluster C).
+=== F. Other Contributions ===
+None yet.