145,363 research outputs found
SciTokens: Capability-Based Secure Access to Remote Scientific Data
The management of security credentials (e.g., passwords, secret keys) for
computational science workflows is a burden for scientists and information
security officers. Problems with credentials (e.g., expiration, privilege
mismatch) cause workflows to fail to fetch needed input data or store valuable
scientific results, distracting scientists from their research by requiring
them to diagnose the problems, re-run their computations, and wait longer for
their results. In this paper, we introduce SciTokens, open source software to
help scientists manage their security credentials more reliably and securely.
We describe the SciTokens system architecture, design, and implementation
addressing use cases from the Laser Interferometer Gravitational-Wave
Observatory (LIGO) Scientific Collaboration and the Large Synoptic Survey
Telescope (LSST) projects. We also present our integration with widely-used
software that supports distributed scientific computing, including HTCondor,
CVMFS, and XrootD. SciTokens uses IETF-standard OAuth tokens for
capability-based secure access to remote scientific data. The access tokens
convey the specific authorizations needed by the workflows, rather than
general-purpose authentication impersonation credentials, to address the risks
of scientific workflows running on distributed infrastructure including NSF
resources (e.g., LIGO Data Grid, Open Science Grid, XSEDE) and public clouds
(e.g., Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud, Microsoft Azure). By improving the
interoperability and security of scientific workflows, SciTokens 1) enables use
of distributed computing for scientific domains that require greater data
protection and 2) enables use of more widely distributed computing resources by
reducing the risk of credential abuse on remote systems.Comment: 8 pages, 6 figures, PEARC '18: Practice and Experience in Advanced
Research Computing, July 22--26, 2018, Pittsburgh, PA, US
A GRID-BASED E-LEARNING MODEL FOR OPEN UNIVERSITIES
E-learning has grown to become a widely
accepted method of learning all over the world. As a
result, many e-learning platforms which have been
developed based on varying technologies were faced
with some limitations ranging from storage
capability, computing power, to availability or access
to the learning support infrastructures. This has
brought about the need to develop ways to
effectively manage and share the limited resources
available in the e-learning platform. Grid computing
technology has the capability to enhance the quality
of pedagogy on the e-learning platform.
In this paper we propose a Grid-based e-learning
model for Open Universities. An attribute of such
universities is the setting up of multiple remotely
located campuses within a country.
The grid-based e-learning model presented in
this work possesses the attributes of an elegant
architectural framework that will facilitate efficient
use of available e-learning resources and cost
reduction, leading to general improvement of the
overall quality of the operations of open universities
- …