[Sh-X] Fw: Shaman-X progress report on 15 Oct 2003

[Dominique Chabord]

> Hello everybody,
>
> Bonjour à tous,
>
> Here is some news about the project.
>
> It's been longer than usual since the last progress report. The reason is
> that many actions were pending up to now. This report is therefore
> a little bit thicker than usual. Sorry.
>
> 1) Technical : WDX try on OpenBSD
> V0.4.1 release has been issued by David and I have performed some test on
> OpenBSD. It shows that WDX implementation of FIFOs doesn't fit OpenBSD.
WDX
> daemon starts and interoperates with other nodes. The FIFO disfunctioning
> affects command interface and no local command can be issued on the
OpenBSD
> machine. This implies some work to figure out how this can be solved.
David
> is in action to setup an OpenBSD server and investigate.
> A solution is already being tested and will be finalized as V0.4.2 soon.
>
> 2) Technical : WDX try on MacOS X
> I used WDX V0.4.1 to build a binary code for Macintosh, and made a try on
> MacOS X 10.1. There are some differences on system setup compared to Linux
> or BSD, but I could start WDX. I faced the same problem as wiyh OpenBSD
> regarding FIFOs. In addition, the checksum function, which permanently
check
> computer group consistency, gave a different value on Mac and Intel, and
> therefore, interoperation was refused. My guess is that this problem
> wouldn't happen in a PowerPC-only configuration. I could not check this
> point, because I didn't have a second Macintosh. David proposed a modified
> version of the code to cover this, and I will test it as soon as possible.
>
> 3) Technical : DDX preliminary architecture.
> We spent some time to figure out how DDX might be implemented using
machine
> virtualisation.
> Remainder :  DDX stands for DummyDoctor-DDX. It is a test bed, training
> workshop, mission configuration validation tool etc.. A virtual machine is
a
> programme which simulates a CPU and its standard resources.
> We made tries with BOCHS and I could install Mandrake on 6 virtual CPUs
> and OpenBSD on a 7th one.
> The network implementation of BOCHS support WDX broadcast messages
> between the 7 nodes and the other computers of the network. BOCHS V2.0.2
> provides predictable enough results to set up an interesting demo. This
demo
> will be finalized by Laurent and me for presenting it at Lyon on October
> 31st. (see below)
>
> 4) Business : Meeting at XP-Conseil, in Paris on October 3rd
> I was invited by Mrs Voictoire Gas, department business manager, to
present
> the project at XP-Conseil's in Paris on October, 3rd. XP-Conseil is the
most
> famous consulting firm in Paris area, regarding security and backup plans
as
> well as crisis management. During the meeting, I got valuable information
> about XP-Conseil, their activities and products.
> I met there about ten top level consultants, kindly invited to the
> presentation by Mrs Gas.
> These people are only doing consultancy and do not contract with
technology
> providers, so they may or may not prescribe our solutions, depending on
> their customer 's objective.
> They develop methods and software aided protection
> and recovery plans.
> XP-Conseil is part of Devoteam, an engineering services group and business
> has just been reorganized.
> I got a very positive feedback about Shaman-X theoritical basement, and
> it was very easy to understand each other and converge on concepts.
> The outcomes were as follows :
> - XP-Conseil will inform other business managers of Devoteam about
Shaman-X
> technology, looking for specific system integration project opportunities.
> - A consultant of XP-Conseil may join our discussion list and our internal
> discussions to stay tuned to project progress.
> http://www.xpconseil.com/ (French only)
>
> 5) Coming Events : October 23rd, Presentation at Lyon Ecole de Management
> Shaman-X project will be presented at Lyon Business School called Ecole de
> Management , ranked number four of French business schools. Presentation
> will be given by Pascal Bourgier (Thesame association) and myself.
> The presentation will be delivered to two groups of students who follow
> post-graduate studies (Mastère) after an engineering diploma. The subject
of
> the presentation will be the business model of Shaman-X project and the
> development prespectives. At the end of the presentation, an in-depth
study
> will be proposed to the student who would like to consider Shaman-X as
> a practical case study for their cursus.
>
> 6) Coming Events : October 31st and November 1st: Free Software Days at
Lyon
> Shaman-X project is kindly invited to participate to Free Software Days
> event organized at Lyon. Shaman-X will be hosted by the Savoie-Aravis
> Linux User Group and will show a demonstration of WDX, running
> over a 9 node cluster, including Linux and OpenBSD.
> The demo will be based on DDX. (see upward).
> http://www.aldil.org/agenda/journees/2003/ (French only)
>
> 7) Coming Events : February 3rd to 5fith, Solutions-Linux-2004 in Paris
> My proposal for a conference at Solutions-Linux-2004 has been officially
> accepted. Solutions-Linux (former Linux-Expo) will focus on clustering
> in its 2004 edition with two major events.
> First a dedicated conference session with three speakers (still
unofficial)
> who will present
> - HP's Single System Image clusters (SSI),
> - Shaman-X
> - OSCAR, high-performance computing cluster.
> Second, a commercial event promoted by DATASWIFT and called
> Clustering-Solutions (in English), and presenting hardware and software
for
> high availability and high performance computing.
> Shaman-X is now looking for a partner who would host WDX demo on their
booth
> at the exhibition for the three days of the event.
> http://www.solutionslinux.fr/en/index.php (bi-lingual)
>
>
> This is all for today,
> Thank you for everybody's contribution,
> ciao,
> Dominique
>