GridPP PMB Meeting 707

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GridPP PMB Meeting 707 (29.04.19)
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Present: Dave Britton (Chair), Tony Cass, Pete Clarke, David Colling, Alastair Dewhurst, Tony Doyle, Pete Gronbech, Jon Hays, Roger Jones, Dave Kelsey, Steve Lloyd, Andrew McNab, Andrew Sansum, Louisa Campbell (Minutes).

Apologies: Gareth Roy

1) OSC Document
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1) PG to contribute the GridPP5 status section. This section is now complete, PG has asked RJ, DC and AD on the amber metrics – AD will update where relevant and provided some clarity on specific metrics.

2) AD to add the numbers required in the Tier-1 section. AD suggested using the average of Tier-1s would be most appropriate.

3) AD to note comments in the Tier-1 section.

4) ALL to look at the plots added to the Tier-1 section and decide whether these are a good precedent – AD will review the plots, insert for disk and reduce the window from July onward.

5) AD to update and add captions. There was discussion on the specific content on what should be incorporated here regarding pledges and allocations etc.

6) PC has picked up Tier-2 status section and included development, production and other aspects; PG has fleshed out some aspects and DK circulated some points on Security that David Crooks has provided for inclusion. GR provided a skeleton and DB has fleshed it out a bit.

7) ALL to look at the plot/table DB added about Tier-2 capacity and agree content. Decisions need to be taken on mentioning storage capacity.

8) GR and PG to consider DB’s comment about the “development” section. This now looks in good shape.

9) RJ to review comment in ATLAS section and write covering similar themes as DC’s CMS report, though it is recognised this period has been unusually busy on several fronts for CMS and DB will preface the CMS with a statement to that effect. LHCb section is fine.

10) DC has provided the CMS section.

11) ALL to review grey and yellow text in JH’s Other VO section to consider updating – PC has undertaken some and others need completing. JH provided some clarity regarding recent edits and mentioned that Dirac, Ligo, LZ, Solid, Snoplus and others have been added.

PC noted all the work done to support other communities and the OSC is an excellent opportunity to promote that.

ACTION 707.1: AD, JH, DC and DK will update relevant sections of the OSC documents and review full document prior to submission.

2) Letter of support from NA62, LZ, Pheno, ILC, Snoplus and Others? WLCG?
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DB spoke with Cristina at NA62 who offered to provide a letter of support, suggesting that other VOs who use GridPP should also provide one and send to the panel stating they rely heavily on GridPP and could not operate without that support. This was agreed as a very welcome offer that should be progressed and DC suggested Ian Bird could do similar, stressing also the people contribution, and possibly a senior manager at CERN. DB will progress this urgently given the time constraints.

3) AOCB
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  1. PC noted he will be speaking with Nuclear Physics on Wednesday regarding IRIS onboarding etc, he will discuss Alice, JLab, etc and will have a discussion with Justin Byrne (Nuclear and Particle Astro replacement for Tony Medland). He will emphasise the benefits and use Ligo and others as examples in the hope that Justin will further promote how useful GridPP will be to Nuclear. PC also suggests that if Justin provided more effort we can provide more formally for Nuclear Physics we would be very open to discuss if additional resource was involved.

GridPP43 – there is availability at Ambleside w/c 26th PMB Tuesday, then collaboration Wed-Fri (finishing Friday afternoon). DB may Doodle the entire collaboration to check dates which can be challenging as it coincides with English school holidays. RJ will provisionally book Ambleside for those dates.

3) Standing Items
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SI-0 Bi-Weekly Report from Technical Group (DC)
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Nothing significant to report.

SI-1 ATLAS Weekly Review and Plans (RJ)
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Nothing significant to report.

SI-2 CMS Weekly Review and Plans (DC)
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Nothing significant to report. AD noted there has been a review of CMS job efficiency and these have raised up again. DC will discuss with AD and Katie separately.

SI-3 LHCb Weekly Review and Plans (PC)
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Nothing significant to report.

SI-4 Production Manager’s report (JC)
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No report submitted.

SI-5 Tier-1 Manager’s Report (AD)
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– We are seeing high outbound packet loss over IPv6. Investigation has restarted now that Philip Garrad is back.

– High CMS job failure rates. Due to the workloads submitted by CMS, there is currently no issue. We are however still looking at making changes to the XrootD caches on the WN to improve performance.

– On Wednesday 24th April gdss738 (LHCb) crashed and was removed from production. It was returned to production on Friday 26th April at lunch.

SI-6 LCG Management Board Report of Issues (DB)
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The MB is tomorrow and updates will be provided at the next PMB.

SI-7 External Contexts (PC)
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PC provided a heads-up that Mark Thompson has mentioned Particle Physics can help Diamond with data reduction and has written to PC and Dave Newbold in this regard. PC will progress and bring in others as appropriate, he has set up a meeting at RAL in the first instance.

REVIEW OF ACTIONS
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644.4: AD will progress capture of funds for Dirac with Mark Wilkinson. (Update: funding from DIRAC. AS has emailed Mark. They are now using it more heavily. Could use the money for tape, but have to be careful not to buy tape we won’t use. May be better charging later rather than during this FY? AD will now progress. 08/10/18 – Leicester are producing a PO for tapes and will send to AD to produce an invoice). Ongoing.

704.5: DB will write a report for the OSC. Ongoing.

705.1: RJ and DC will work up text for Q4 of the panel response. Done.

705.2: DB and PG will consider how to deal with the Deployment Status section of the OSC documents. Done.

706.1: ALL should consider individuals who could take on JC responsibilities. Ongoing.

ACTIONS AS OF 29.04.19
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644.4: AD will progress capture of funds for Dirac with Mark Wilkinson. (Update: funding from DIRAC. AS has emailed Mark. They are now using it more heavily. Could use the money for tape, but have to be careful not to buy tape we won’t use. May be better charging later rather than during this FY? AD will now progress. 08/10/18 – Leicester are producing a PO for tapes and will send to AD to produce an invoice). Ongoing.

704.5: DB will write a report for the OSC. Ongoing.

706.1: ALL should consider individuals who could take on JC responsibilities. Ongoing.

707.1: AD, JH, DC and DK will update relevant sections of the OSC documents.