Introduction
This document describes the architecture of the KISTI-NCSA Science Gateway (KNSG) Framework. To fully describe this architecture, this document also provides information about external technologies that were used to build the framework (e.g. Eclipse).
KNSG provides an extensible open source software platform for building HPC software applications that are managed by PTPFlow. The KNSG frameworks provides an easy to use graphical user interface for setting up and launching HPC workflows and views to manage the execution and retrieve results. The initial framework builds upon the Eclipse Rich Client Platform (Eclipse RCP), PTPFlow and Bard.
Purpose
The purpose of this document is to outline the major components of the KNSG Framework architecture for developers who are interested in using and extending the framework for their software applications. All software extension points are documented with the eAIRS CFD workflow use case used as an example concrete implementation.
Scope
The result of version 1.0 is an initial framework for building new HPC applications with some semantic capabilities and an easy to use graphical user interface for setting up, launching and monitoring HPC workflows.
Definitions, Acronyms and Abbreviations
See the Glossary for definitions, acronyms and abbreviations used in this document.
Overview
This document should contain all of the required information for developing new KNSG applications. Where external technologies are used, there will be links to documentation for them. The Use Case section indentifies the initial goal of the project, which is to provide users with an application for setting up, launching and monitoring the eAIRS CFD workflow.
Architectural Goals and Constraints
Development Tools and Resources
Eclipse RCP/Subversion
The Eclipse RCP platform provides an plugin-based architecture for building new applications. Eclipse provides core application functionality (such as drag and drop, window management, extension points and extension capabilities, etc) that allows users to build professional-looking application, with native look-and-feel, on multiple platforms and allowing them to focus on their value-add instead of building the entire application framework from scratch.
Graphical Editing Framework
The graphical editing framework is a toolkit for graphing and editing models. You can learn more about GEF here and here.
C/C++ Development Plugin
The PTPFlow library used included in KNSG uses a small amount of functionality from the C++ Development Plugin provided by Eclipse since PTPFlow was initially intended to be just views and perspectives withing the Eclipse IDE for C+. The C+ IDE was chosen primarily for it's size (it is the smallest Ecli with an easier to use and pse download). This also illustrates the power of KNSG's plugin-based architecture. KNSG version 1.0 puts an easier to use GUI on top of PTPFlow making it easier for novice users to run HPC Workflows while still providing the full capabilities of PTPFlow for advanced users. For more information about PTPFlow, go here.
Java
JavaSE 1.6
The KNSG framework is built against JavaSE 1.6; however, it should also build with JavaSE 1.5 since no JavaSE 1.6 language specific features are being used.
Initial Use Case: eAIRS CFD
The initial use case is the eAIRS RCP application which will be built using the KNSG Application Framework. This version of eAIRS and KNSG will focus on providing an easy to use graphical user interface for setting up the eAIRS CFD Workflow and launching it with PTPFlow. After launching the workflow, PTPFlow's monitoring facilities will be used to monitor the execution of the workflow and then the framework will provide the ability to retrieve workflow results.
Data Catalog
Repositories
Interfaces and Base Class
public IDataset retrieveDataset(DatasetId id); public List<DatasetProperties> listAllDatasetProperties(); public boolean hasDataset(DatasetId id); public boolean deleteDataset(DatasetProperties properties); public DatasetProperties getDatasetProperties(DatasetId id); public boolean isDisabled(); public void setDisabled(boolean disabled); public boolean isWritable();
public DatasetId importDataset(DatasetProperties properties, List<URI> files); public void saveDatasetProperties(DatasetProperties properties);
protected boolean disabled = false;
public boolean isWritable() {
return true;
}
Local Repository
This represents a concrete implementation of a repository on the local machine. It provides methods for managing data on the local machine.
// Base directory where the local repository is located protected File baseDirectory; // Directory containing the datasets protected File datasetDirectory; // Directory containing the dataset properties protected File propertiesDirectory;