More Grids (But Enough Is Enough)

Really, I'm not that enamored with grid computing. But it is so darn interesting.

So yesterday I mentioned how the Open Science Grid benefited from a $30 million largess. In today's grid news, CERN reports that the Enabling Grids for E-sciencE (EGEE) project has been able to sustain more than 30,000 jobs a day -- over 1,000,000 per month -- for a period of six months this year.

These computing tasks range from simulations of molecular drug docking for neglected diseases to geophysical analysis of oil and gas fields. Clusters of hundreds and even thousands of PCs around the world, have been executing these calculations -- in total over 25,000 central processor units (CPUs) are involved. Several million gigabytes of data storage in disk and tape facilities also contribute to make EGEE the world’s largest scientific Grid infrastructure.

An offshoot of the EGEE project is the Grid middleware distribution called gLite, which ensures the seamless operation of this global computing facility. In addition to scientific applications, EGEE has targeted a range of business applications for support, including financial analysis. Recently, successful demonstrations have been made of interoperation with other major national and international Grids, such as the Open Science Grid in the U.S. and NAREGIin Japan.

Okay, that's it for grids, for the time being--unless, of course, something grid-worthy happens in the meantime.

Posted by Jon Erickson at 11:41 AM  Permalink