Simple Grid Access Using the Business Process Execution Language

Scientists require means of exploiting large numbers of grid resources in a fully integrated manner through the definition of computational processes specifying the sequence of tasks and services they require. The deployment of such processes, however, can prove difficult in networked environments, due to the presence of firewalls, software requirements and platform incompatibility. Using the Business Process Execution Language (BPEL) standard, we propose here an architecture that builds on a delegation model by which scientist may rely on middle-tier services to orchestrate subsets of the processes on their behalf. We define a set of inter-related workflows that correspond to basic patterns observed on the eMinerals minigrid. These will enable scientists to incorporate job submission and monitoring, data storage and transfer management, and automated metadata harvesting in a single unified process, which they may control from their desktops using the Simple Grid Access tool.