Experiences from Cyberinfrastructure Development …...Experiences from Cyberinfrastructure...
Transcript of Experiences from Cyberinfrastructure Development …...Experiences from Cyberinfrastructure...
Experiences from Cyberinfrastructure Development for Multiuser Remote Instrumentation
Prasad Calyam, Ph.D.David Hudak, Ph.D.
Ashok Krishnamurthy, Ph.D.Karen Tomko, Ph.D.
Cyberinfrastructure and Software Development Group, OSCIEEE e-Science Conference, Indianapolis, December 10th 2008
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• OSC-developed Solutions
• Multi-user Remote Instrumentation?
Overview
• Application Scenario and Components
• Deployment Case Studies
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Remote Instrumentation Overview• Academia and Industry use scientific instruments
– E.g., Electron Microscopes, Telescopes, Spectrometers– Used for research and training/classroom purposes – Such instruments are expensive to buy and maintain
• $450K - $ 4Million initial purchase + Staff $ to maintain
• Remote Instrumentation– Remote access of instruments, related devices and their data
resources via the Internet
• Benefits– Access for remote students and researchers– Return on Investment (ROI) for instrument labs– Avoids duplication of instrument investments for funding agencies
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Remote Instrumentation Application Scenario
OSC’s Remote Instrumentation Program
• RI cyberinfrastructure development for Ohio-based universities involves using OSC’s state-wide resources
– Networking, HPC, Storage, Analytics
• Pilot program funded by the Ohio Board of Regents
• Goal: “Leverage Ohio’s investments in scientific instruments, wide area networking, high-performance computing, and data storage to foster academia-industry collaborations involving remote instrumentation”
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OSC’s Remote Instrumentation Partners• The Ohio State University
– Scanning Electron Microscope, Material Science Engg. Dept.– Raman Spectrometer, Chemistry Dept.– McGraw-Hill Telescope, Astronomy Dept.
• Miami University – NMR Spectrometer, Chemistry and Biochemistry Dept.– Unipulsed EPR Spectrometer, Chemistry and Biochemistry Dept.– Transmission Electron Microscope, Geography Dept.
• Ohio University – Nuclear Accelerator, Physics and Astronomy Dept.
Remote Instrumentation Components
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Instrument Lab Site• Resource Scheduling• Sample Handling• Use Policy • Usage Billing
OSC• Web-portal Development• Data Storage Management• Real-time Analytics • Network and Data Security
Remote User Site• Remote Observation• Remote Operation• Voice/Text Chat• Lab Notebook
Technical Challenges• Network bandwidth
– Last-mile bottlenecks lead to improper operation – can cause expensive instrument damage
– Frame rate and video quality tradeoffs
• Communications – Remote User(s) and Operator co-ordination – VNC/RDP, VoIP,
Videoconference, Presence, Control passing, Web cam– Simultaneous multi-device views for user workflows
• Dead man's switch – Fail-safe method to stop the service in case instrument Operator
becomes incapacitated
• File system access – Web services– User accounts, Data read on instrument file system, Data
read/write for analytics on mass storage file system
• Network Security– VPN, Ports, Firewall rules, Encryption/Authentication
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Policy Challenges• Scheduling Policy
– Prioritizing users – PI/Co-PI, Graduate Students, Industry– Synchronizing calendars of devices and personnel– Sample handling
• Licensing – Remote users observation/operation and analytics
• Service Level Agreements– Vendor– ISP/ASP
• Safe-use Policy – Expert privileges, Novice privileges
• Billing– Setup surcharge, Fee/hr, Fee/session, Resource units
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Case Studies
• Account of OSC experiences with cyber-enabling various kinds of scientific instruments
– Solutions evaluated– Solutions developed– Open issues
• Three Case Studies– OSU Material Science and Engg. Dept. – Electron Microscopes– OSU Chemistry Dept. – Raman Spectrometer– MU Bio-Chemistry Dept. – 850 MHz NMR
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Case Study-I: OSU CAMM• OSU Center for Accelerated Maturation of Materials (CAMM)
has acquired high-end Electron Microscopes – Used for materials modeling studies at sub-angstrom level
• OSC providing networking, analytics and storage support for remote microscopy
– Permanent console at Stark State for Timken access• Hardware-based (ThinkLogical) KVMoIP solution
– Image processing of samples (automation with MATLAB) for Analytics service
– Lab Notebook for image management
• Remote Microscopy Demonstrations– Supercomputing, Tampa, FL (Nov 2006)– Internet2 Fall Member Meeting, Chicago, IL (Dec 2006)– Stark State University, Canton, OH (Mar 2007)
Network Connection Quality Vs User Control• Higher TCP throughput (i.e., mouse and keyboard activity) on
poor network connections Increased user effort with keyboard and mouse on poor connections
• “Congestion begets more congestion”
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Task-1 Task-2 Task-3
Task-1 Task-2 Task-3Task-1 Task-2 Task-3
1 Gbps LAN – Expert
Public 100 Mbps LAN – Expert 100 Mbps WAN – Expert
User expends minimum effort with keyboard and
mouse to complete use-caseUser expends notably more
effort with keyboard and mouse to complete use-case
User expends a “lot” of effort with keyboard and mouse to
complete use-case
1400 B/s
140 s
900 B/s
100 s
60 B/s
60 s
Image Processing• Automated Matlab processing of electron microscope images
– Alternate to Adobe Photoshop (Fovea Pro 4 plug-in) filters that take multiple days to process
– Filters: E.g., Image Blurring/De-Blurring, Image Dilation/Opening– Matlab GUI development for sample filters testing before batch jobs
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Processed Image
Inputs
Gaussian Blur
Dilate Image
Case Study-II: OSU Chemistry
• Recent purchase of a Combined Raman - FTIR Microprobe– To get complimentary Raman-IR information about chemicals
• OSC custom developed a Remote Instrumentation Collaboration Environment (RICE) software
– Enable local students and researchers to work from comfort of their offices or homes
– Access for remote collaborators: California State University, Dominguez Hills, CA; Oakwood University, Huntsville, AL
• Active RICE testing and concurrent development in progress– “Pink Screen” GPU problem– Dual-screen resolution issues– Overlay error issues in Vendor software
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OSU Chemistry Instrument Lab
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4XEM Webcam
Live View on Web browser; Dual monitor
PC withadvanced network & multimedia cards
Cyber-enabled Instrument
“Pink Screen” GPU Problem• Software-Software VNC issue
– OS not aware of GPU video processing
• Solution: Use Hardware-Software KVMoIP (e.g. Adder), or Hardware-Hardware KVMoIP (e.g. Thinklogical)
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Remote VNC Client View
Dual-screen Resolution Problem• Default VNC (i.e., Ultra VNC) distribution issue with dual
monitors and extended desktop
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Remote VNC Client ViewLeft Monitor Right Monitor
Dual-screen Resolution OSC-Solution• Solution: OSC-patch with increased image geometry
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Remote RICE Client View
Left Monitor Right Monitor
Overlay Error Issue in Vendor Software
• Remote VNC client refresh causes local video overlay error
• Solution: Adhoc trials - notified vendor support
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Local View with error message
Left Monitor Right Monitor
OSU RICE Solution Screenshot
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OSU RICE Solution Features• “Network-aware” video encoding
– Optimizes frame rates based on available network bandwidth – Manual video-quality adjustment slider
• “Network-aware” action blocking– Warns user of network congestion – Blocks user-actions during high network congestion scenarios
• Collaboration tools for Multi-user support– Peer-to-Peer VoIP/ Multi-user VoIP– Multi-user Colored-text Chat– Multi-user Presence– Multi-user Control-lock passing
• Multiple display resolutions– Small screen– Full screen– Dual screen (remote site with dual monitors and extended desktop)
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OSU RICE Solution Demo
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Case Study-III: MU Biochemistry• Recent purchase of 850 MHz NMR – first of its kind in North America
• For studying supra molecular architectures and functional materials• RICE integrated with web-portal for management of remote
instrumentation sessions, user collaboration and data– Access for remote collaborators: Bowling Green State University,
Ohio University, Muskingum College, Talawanda High School
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MU-NMR System Deployment
Web-portal User Work-flows
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Web-portal Features
• User Accounts and Privileges
• Management of Instruments, Projects, Samples, Sessions, Experiments
• KVMoIP and RICE access control
• Asynchronous chat for remote monitoring of experiment progress
• Experiment data archival at OSC storage
• Analysis of stored data sets using OSC-hosted Topspin software
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Web-portal Architecture
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Web-portal and RICE Screenshots
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RICE use-cases for Research and Training• Remote participants can view expert (also remote!) controlling a
scientific instrument– Efficiently: Multi-party VoIP, Presence and Chat collaboration– Reliably: Network awareness mitigates instrument damage
• Expert can pass control to remote participants – Train students to operate the instrument during class– Allow another expert to study the sample under study
• Researchers and Students can conduct experiments at their assigned slots on the instruments
Conclusion
• Developing cyberinfrastructures for RI requires: (a) Understanding and overcoming multi-disciplinary
challenges to develop solutions(b) Developing reconfigurable-and-integrated solutions that
need to be tailored on a per-instrument basis(c) Close collaborations between instrument labs,
infrastructure providers, and application developers
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Future Directions
• “Reconfigurable-and-Integrated” Tools and Web-portals– RICE, Wikis, Lab Notebook, Mailing lists, Calendar, …
• Human-centered Remote Instrumentation solutions for “at-the-instrument” experience
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ROI Video Encoding
Human-aware Codec Adaptation
Thank you!
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MU RICE Solution Demo
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