EGI-TCB action 03/05
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"IGE/HH HH to identify the sites that are running Globus; pass the list to TF 
to check with NGIs if there are communication issues."


Response
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As a general remark I would like to comment on the method of the survey first. 
The survey stated:
    "If you have NO plans of this kind, you DO NOT need to reply."

I think to formulate a survey in this way is problematic: emails may get lost 
in transit or be sorted into spam folders automatically, or be simply 
overlooked in the daily email flood - all resulting in the non-delivery of the 
email. Thus a non-answer does not necessarily mean that an NGI is not 
interested in Globus or UNICORE.

Furthermore, IGE not only addresses EGI but also other Grid infrastructures 
not associated with EGI, like DEISA and PRACE, and also Globus users not 
affiliated with one of the big infrastructures. Therefore it is to be expected 
that the feedback IGE received from its poll is different (and more 
comprehensive) than that from just asking the NGIs. Finland, for instance, runs 
Globus services on their HPC machines and uses IGE support for this, but they 
currently do not plan to run Globus in EGI.

In addition, we spot checked some of the NGIs' answers:

Rumania: 
I think there is a cultural misunderstanding here: the answer is indeed kept 
very vague, but the interest is real! When we asked Alex Stanciu from NGI_Ro 
he replied that he knew about the Globus demand. He remembered the survey and 
that he mentioned about the interest for Globus and Unicore in NGI_RO. Nobody 
asked him for further details. So from his point of view, he had signalled 
interest in Globus.

Poland: 
It turned out that there was some information flow problem inside the Polish 
PL-Grid Operation Center and the Globus request was not properly propagated. 
Tiziana should have received an update by now.

Netherlands: 
Here also communication issues prevented proper communication from the sites 
to the NGI. This has been corrected by now and Tiziana should have received an
update.

United Kingdom: 
Not clear what happened, probably email had not been answered at all. Tiziana 
should have received an update by now.

Since we discovered a lot of NGI-internal communication problems in those 
cases that we checked, this may also be the case for the other NGIs. Perhaps 
EGI could make sure that the NGIs really pass these questions on to their 
users in their country and collect their answers and needs? If we need 
indicators on the interest of Globus in EGI, then we would need to do this in 
a more appropriate way and with a strong involvement of IGE, which has been 
established as an interest body for these communities in Europe.