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GOCDB/Visualisation Portal User Documentation

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Introduction

This user documentation describes usage of the GOCDB4 Central Visualisation Portal. This portal presents a view of topology and resources information for the whole EGI infrastructure. This consists mainly of:

  • Participating National Grid Initiatives (NGI)
  • Grid Sites providing resources to the infrastructure
  • Resources and services, including maintenance plans for these resources
  • Participating people, and their roles within EGI operations


GOCDB version supported in this documentation: 4.0 (August 2010)


Getting Started

Important notes

  • This documentation is targeted to users which already have a basic understanding of how GOCDB3 works. If this is not the case please refer first to GOCDB3 User Documentation
  • GOCDB4 central visualisation portal is a Read only system. Read/write functionalities will be part of the regional GOCDB portals (or their centrally hosted equivalent) and will be described when these features are available.


Accessing GOCDB4 central visualisation portal

To access the web interface, you need an X509 digital certificate installed in your browser, delivered by one of the recognised EU-Grid-PMA Certification Authorities.


How is the information organised?

The following sets of information in GOCDB4 are organised in a similar way to GOCDB3:

  • Sites and related information
  • Service endpoints and related information
  • Groups (NGIs, ROCs, Countries) and related information
  • Users and related information
  • Downtimes and related information


Main changes between GOCDB3 and GOCDB4 are related to:

  • Nodes and related information: the notion of node disappears in GOCDB4 and is replaced by the notion of "service endpoints"
  • Groups in GOCDB4 are a generic replacement of specific groups such as ROC or Country.


Other documentation and help

If you want (or need) to know more about GOCDB4, please browse GOCDB Documentation Index


Viewing information

For complete definitions of the different groups of information please refer to GOCDB3 User Documentation

Viewing users

Each user account has its own user details page which is accessible to anyone. There is currently no facility for listing all users in the database. List of users that have a role on a given site appears on site details pages (see section about sites). It is also possible to search for a user's account using the search feature on the side menu.

Viewing sites

A site listing page shows a listing of all the sites in the database, with controls to page through the listing. The table headers can be clicked to set the ordering (ascending or descending).

Each site also has its own listing page. By clicking the link to view a site, you can see all of the site's information

  • Site listing page is available from the side menu in GOCDB4 by clicking on the Browse Sites link.
  • sites belonging to a given NGI/ROC are also listed from the ROC details pages (see below)

Viewing service endpoints

A service endpoint is a single entity formed by a hostname and a hosted service.

There are different pages in GOCDB4 where service endpoints are listed:

  • A full service endpoints listing page, that shows a listing of all the endpoints in the database, with controls to page through the listing. The table headers can be clicked to set the ordering.
  • Site details page, where all the service endpoints belonging to this site are listed

Each endpoint also has its own listing page. By clicking the link to view a service endpoint, you can see all associated information.

  • Service Endpoints listing page is available from the side menu in GOCDB4 by clicking on the Browse Service Endpoints link.

Viewing downtimes

There are different pages on which downtimes are listed:

  • An "archives" page, linked from the main menu, that allows to search through all downtimes
  • A "recent and planned" page , linked from the main menu, that presents a search tool implemented by the EGI Operations Portal
  • Site details page, where all the downtimes associated to the site are listed
  • Service endpoint details page, where all the downtimes associated to the service endpoint are listed

Each downtime has its own listing page, accessible by clicking on the "view" link in downtime listing pages.

Viewing Groups and Group information

The main page listing groups actually shows NGIs/ROCs, and is available from

  • List of NGIs/ROCs and associated contacts, linked from the main menu

Groups are also listed from site details pages (all groups the site belongs to). Because groups are generic entities in GOCDB4, there are many logical notions that are presented in this way: NGIs, Countries, Production Infrastructure... pretty much everything that groups sites together is defined as a group.

Each group has its own listing page, accessible by clicking on the "view" link in group listing pages. A group details page shows users with a role on that group, as well as member sites and associated contacts and roles.

Help

How to and FAQ

What is so different between GOCDB3 and GOCDB4?

GOCDB3 and GOCDB4 are two animals with a similar shell but very different guts... you might want to browse the GOCDB4 architecture documentation to know more about what makes GOCDB4 special.

When will GOCDB4 replace GOCDB3 for good?

All plans and scheduled are visible on the GOCDB3 Decommission Plan wiki page

Why can't I update information in GOCDB4 visualisation portal?

One of the main features of GOCDB4 is its ability to be distributed to NGIs, while keeping a central view of all EGI data. GOCDB4 visualisation portal, as its name suggests, has been designed as a read-only repository. It gathers and mirrors sets of information maintained and updated elsewhere.

The read/write version of GOCDB4, which will be the base for regional portals, is available at [1]

Why can't there be one single system just like GOCDB3?

NGIs that will install their own regional GOCDB will update information regionally, and this will be reflected centrally on the Visualisation Portal. This is exactly what the current configuration offers: a system to update data that can be split and regionalised (GOCDB4 input system) and a system that will remain central and mirror all data (GOCDB4 visualisation portal). Regionalisation can't happen if we keep one single read/write central system.

How long does it take for recently added/updated data to appear in GOCDB4 visualisation portal?

When information is updated on GOCDB3 web portal, it is picked up by a synchronisation mechanism that runs every 10 minutes. Most information will then show up in the GOCDB4 visualisation portal within the next 10mn. However in some particular cases where caches are needed, it may take up to 20mn before the proper information is displayed.

Known Issues

  • Sorting tables by certain fields doesn't work. Although sorting should be possible by any column headers, some of them don't work.
  • Some display problems in Internet Explorer. Some tables don't show up very nicely when using IE.
  • Downtime archives search tool doesn't show downtimes at site level. Only downtimes declared on service endpoints are shown. This is not an issue as such since all downtimes will be declared in GOCDB4 at service level, but this misses some of the information coming from GOCDB3.

Give us feedback

We value any kind of feedback you would like to send us about GOCDB4 central visualisation portal. Please do so by posting your comments to gocdb-admins@mailtalk.ac.uk