Virtualization and Grid Utilization within the CANFAR Project
S. Gaudet, P. Armstrong, N. Ball, E. L. Chapin, Patrick Dowler, Ian Gable, Sharon Goliath, S. Fabbro, L. Ferrarese, Stephen Gwyn, N. Hill, Dustin Jenkins, J. J. Kavelaars, Brian Major, John Ouellette, Matthew Paterson, Michael Peddle, Chris J. Pritchet, David J. Schade, R. Sobie · NPARC · 2011
The Canadian Advanced Network For Astronomical Research (CANFAR) is an operational system for the delivery, processing, storage, analysis, and distribution of very large astronomical datasets. CANFAR combines the Canadian national research network (CANARIE), grid processing and storage resources (Compute Canada) and a data center (CADC) into a unified Platform-as-a-service (PaaS) cyberinfrastructure supporting Canadian astronomy projects. The CANFAR processing service is based on virtualization and combines features of the grid and cloud processing models to provide a self-configuring virtual cluster deployed on multiple cloud clusters. The service makes use of many technologies from the grid, cloud and Virtual Observatory communities.