EGI OLA SLA framework

Main

EGI.eu operations services

Support

Documentation

Tools

Activities

Performance

Technology

Catch-all Services

Resource Allocation

Security

Crucial to EGI is the maximization of the Quality of Service provided by EGI services and experienced by an end-user. Services have to comply with a minimum set of requirements to jointly offer a reliable, secure and highly available service infrastructure. These requirements are defined by the OLA/SLA framework, which supports service management at various levels: Resource Centre (RC), Resource infrastructure Provider (RP), EGI.eu and Technology Provider.

The framework is comprised of agreements defining the minimum set of services and the corresponding minimum performance provided:

• Operational Level Agreement (OLA): An agreement between an IT Service Provider and another part of the same organisation. An OLA supports the IT Service Provider’s delivery of IT Services to Users. The OLA defines the goods or Services to be provided and the responsibilities of both parties.
• Service Level Agreement (SLA): An agreement between a Service Provider and a customer/client. The SLA describes the IT Service, documents service level targets and specifies the responsibilities of the Service Provider and the customer/client.. A single SLA may cover multiple IT Services or multiple customers/clients.
• Underpinning Agreement (UA): An agreement between an IT service provider and a third party. The third party provides goods or services that support delivery of an IT Service to a customer/client. The Underpinning Agreement defines targets and responsibilities that are required to meet agreed service level targets in one or more Service Level Agreements.

Federated Operations Service

Federated Operations service brings together the operational tools, processes and people necessary to guarantee standard operation of heterogeneous infrastructures from multiple independent providers, with a lightweight central coordination. This includes, for example, the monitoring, accounting, configuration and other services required to federate service provision for access by multiple research communities. A federated environment is key to uniform service and enables cost-efficient operations, while allowing resource centres to retain responsibility of local operations.

Federated Operations service's components are provided by EGI.eu to NGIs according to EGI.eu SLA supported by set of EGI.eu OLA agreed with each of EGI partners responsible for given service component.

High-Throughput Computing Platform and Cloud Computing Platform

1. VO SLA - define user specific conditions under which EGI resources are provided to EGI User (VO). Agreed between EGI.eu and VO.
   
2. VO OLA -  define user specific conditions under which Resource Center resources are provided to support VO SLAs. Agreed between EGI.eu and Resource Center.
   

EGI Infrastructure quality

To ensure production quality of EGI Infrastructure OLA/SLA framework contains 3 additional agreements:

Resource Center (RC) OLA

1. Resource Center (RC) OLA

This agreement is defined between a Resource Centre (RC) and the respective Resource infrastructure Provider (RP), who provides the services for the federation of Resource Centres.

Resource infrastructure Provider (RP) OLA

1. Resource infrastructure Provider (RP) OLA

This agreement is defined between a Resource infrastructure Provider (RP), its respective Resource Centres (RCs), and EGI.eu. The RP OLA defines the minimum services at a national level that are required to NGIs to be part of a pan-European infrastructure.

Technology Provider (TP) Underpinning Agreement

1. Technology Provider (TP) Underpinning Agreement

External Technology Providers are responsible for ensuring the maintenance, evolution and support of the software components that are deployed in EGI Production infrastructure.

Engagement with Technology Providers is ensured via the establishment of Underpinning Agreements, whose purpose is to guarantee third level support in incident management through the EGI helpdesk system GGUS . This is particularly important to guarantee the provisioning of reliable and secure services by making sure that incidents, critical issues and vulnerabilities are handled in a timely manner.