Using Cloud Computing and Web 2.0 Technologies to Create Comprehensive User Environments

At the Grid Research Centre at the University of Calgary, and in collaboration with HP Labs, we have been exploring how cloud computing and Web 2.0 technologies can be used in academic and enterprise settings to provide users with comprehensive and transparent environments for accessing applications. Web 2.0 technologies such as social networking platforms (e.g., Facebook) allow users to keep connected and provide easy access to a wide variety of applications. We feel that the use of social networking platforms in academia and enterprise will allow researchers and employees to more easily collaborate and share information with each other. They could also provide a more unified and transparent interface for accessing applications. As demand for applications can vary significantly and is difficult to determine before they are deployed, it would be advantageous to run applications on cloud computing infrastructures where they can be scaled easily according to demand.

To illustrate the effectiveness of this approach we have developed a demonstrator that provides users with a comprehensive and transparent environment for accessing the Fire Dynamics Simulator (FDS) , an application developed by NIST. Facebook was used as a social networking platform to provide access to FDS. Users are able to upload and edit input files, submit and resubmit simulations, visualize results, share and discuss results with other users, etc., all in a single integrated environment. Virtual machine technology was used to develop a cloud computing infrastructure to host the simulations and visualizations. The infrastructure is able to dynamically adapt and scale according to demand.

Below is a video of the demonstrator including some introductory slides. A version of the video in much larger resolution is available here.



Some papers we have published related to this work include:

• R. Curry, C. Kiddle, N. Markatchev, R. Simmonds, T. Tan, M. Arlitt, and B. Walker. ASPEN: An Automated Service Provisioning ENvironment for Data Centres. In Proceedings of the 15th HP Software University Association Workshop (HP-SUA), 2008.


• R. Curry, C. Kiddle, N. Markatchev, R. Simmonds, T. Tan, M. Arlitt, and B. Walker. Facebook Meets the Virtualized Enterprise. To appear in Proceedings of the 12th International IEEE Enterprise Distributed Object Computing Conference (EDOC), 2008. (An extended version of this paper appears as an HP Labs Technical Report: HPL-2008-72.)