A Data Engine for Science Gateways: enabling easy data transfer and sharing

Abstract

Grid infrastructures allow users to access and use computational and storage facilities distributed in different locations around the world. Science Gateways (SG) are recently emerging as high-level web environments that ease Grid access and use. However, although SGs simplify job management, providing a web interface by which jobs can be submitted with a few "clicks", their capabilities to do an effective and intuitive data management are still at an early stage. Actually, Grid storage elements use dedicated protocols not supported by common applications such as web browsers. This makes a smooth integration of data management services in a Science Gateway quite difficult. In this work we show the Data Engine, a new SG component providing users with the ability to move data to storage elements and share them in an easy and clever way. The component operates between the Grid storage and the user, providing a file-system-like experience.

The ArchaeoGRID e-Infrastructure for Research, Management and Exploitation of Archaeological and Historical Heritage

“…Nowadays, such requirements can be achieved by using Science Gateways Barbera, 2011;Barbera, 2012;Barbera, 2013;Scardaci, 2013;Bruno, 2013;Carrubba, 2013), that are becoming very popular. The Science Gateway is a web portal providing access to the Grid infrastructure and applications and giving to users the possibility to store, manage, catalog and share large data collections and develop new applications with little concern for where the computation actually take place.…”