Proposed topics for the HGF Allianze Workshop (24/25 Januar)

Theory

• Introduction : dCache - A bird's view
  • what makes up a storage element in the grid context
  • Supported Features (p2p,load balancing,maintenance, space management ...)
  • Supported Protocols (dCap, SRM, xrootd, ftp ...)
• Presentation of dCache components
  • Which component is involved in which action
• Administrative issues with dCache
  • some slides on firewall issues, used ports and portranges
  • status of GridFTP-support
  • PostgreSQL tuning (dCache's database backend)
• How far one can get with YAIM?
  • When is YAIM sufficient and when is manual setup required?
  • dCache's configuration concept and fundamental config files explained

Hands on

We will provide the necessary infrastructure for 6 independent playgrounds, assuming that groups of 2 people work together in front of a ssh-terminal (your laptops). Our setup will be backed by virtual machines, providing for each group access to 2 dCache server nodes and a (shared ) Grid UI.

• Unit 1: Basic dCache install using YAIM
  • learn how to setup a complete dCache instance (including SRM, GridFTP, 2 Pools, InfoProvider) on a single machine
  • overview of running components - what does the web-interface and the command line report on this
  • dCache admin tools
  • getting in touch with dCache: simple file tranfers using different protocols and clients
  • basic dCache monitoring: status of pools, what is published to the Information System (InfoProvider)
• Unit 2: Enabling multi-VO support
  • adding pools on a 2nd machine plus a new VO
  • setting up authentication/authorization (gPlazma)
  • grouping pools according to VOs (migrating a pool to another machine, setup of the PoolManager)
• Unit 3: Handling 3rd-party transfers
  • transferring files between (SRM-enabled) sites
• Unit 4: Some tips on error handling
  • recipes on how to break down and fix errors
  • using the example of a failing pool
• Unit 5: Manually setting up compontents (beyond the YAIM installer)
  • demonstrated by migrating the SRM to a separate host

Miscellaneous

• experiences/questions from the admins (that is you!)
• Management: how to structure the German dCache support in the future

---

Last Modified by patrick/martin @ Sat Feb 27 17:06:20 2021