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ACTION: RE to start the preparation for the SIG-NGN

3. Updates on GEANT (the association) work

• TFs/SIGs updates

  • TF-MNM - NH noted that the Task Force is running out of enthusiasm and suggested that when its charter expires we should think of moving tf-mnm to a SIG which would fit more the way the current group operates. The current charter is still the reference under which the group operates, although there is no real concrete output.

    The TF is working closer to eduroam global governance committee and this has provided useful feedback to both groups; it brings the GeGC closer to more concrete aspects of the operations of eduroam as a global service.

    There are less face-to-face meeting lately and more topic-based videoconference, for which there is a lot of enthusiasm.
    
    
  • TF-CSIRT/TI - TF-CSIRT is a different type of task force, in fact the name task force is probably not really fitting this group as the Trusted Introducer service and TRANSITS training  are part of the TF-CSIRT service umbrella.

    There is a review ongoing of Trusted Introducer, to evaluate if it is still offering the right services to the community  as well as the way in which the service is procured.

    NH reported on the feeling (only shared by some of the TF-CSIRT participants) that TF-CSIRT can operate independently from the GÉANT. This seems be based on some underestimation on what GÉANT offer in terms of support and coordination not only in organising the meetings (which are mini-conferences) but also in preparing minutes and handling administrative work.
    
    
  • TF-MSP - One of the main area of work is the aggregate procurement approach that is gaining significant consensus; there is already collaboration with the service activity in the GÉANT project that procures clouds services. Plans are to expand the framework beyond clouds.

    Another aspect of interest is NRENs Acceptable Use Policy, which is covered for the network services, but it should be expanded to encompass all other services.

    The task-force is healthy and there is still significant attendance and participation during the meetings. There is a lot of interest in the output but not a lot of engagement from the whole group to work towards these outputs. Most of the work seems to fall on a few people. This seems to be a trend in many other activities.
    
    
  • TF-WebRTC - The TF work is linked to the counterpart Service Activity in the GÉANT project (Real-Time Applications and Multimedia Management), in fact the TFs can be considered the outreach of the GÉANT-funded WebRTC work.

    There is interest in some NRENs in open source solutions 1  (JITSI). Work to this extend is being carried out as a joint effort  in the task force and the service activity in GÉANT with the aim to implement an open source platform. The idea is to create a trust an API on top of the secure and trusted WebRTC platform operated by GÉANT. Plans are also to use the task force to create and hackathon to reach out more developers.

    PSz said we should focused on the GN3plus EC review recommendation “the network is not so interesting but the applications on top of that are”.

  • TF-STORAGE - PZs reported that the task force is business as usual. There was a gathering at TNC targeted at both the industry and the GÉANT Community. OwnCloud and Zettabox (they work similarly to dropbox but they are EU-based) attended the meeting and presented as well. Aconet, University of Vienna and SWITCH seem to be interested in Zettabox . The plan is to offer that under the  GÉANT cloud service catalogue: https://catalogue.clouds.GÉANT.net/#/cloudservices . 

    The TF-Storage is moving more and more towards cost effective storage. Things like the OwnCloud Agreement and FileSender are out of the task force.

  • SIG-ISM - AS reported that the SIG-ISM has accepted to reopen the group to all parties interested in ISM, which in principle makes the group available for participation beyond the NRENs community. The aim of this SIG is to create a community of security management professionals in the NRENs and to discuss security management and security standards at NRENs level.

    In the last months the SIG has been particularly active. On the 12th and 13th of May the 1st official workshop was held at the Imperial College in London which was both well attended and received. Alf Moens (SURFnet) gave a presentation of the SIG during the last REFEDS meeting with the aim to raise awareness on the group, which could provide support for federations and any identified security risks. 

    The SIG as part of their outreach has also established a communication with the Security for Collaboration Infrastructure group (SCI, https://www.eugridpma.org/sci/) a collaboration of security staff from several large-scale distributed computing infrastructures, including EGI, OSG, PRACE, wLCG, and XSEDE. The two groups are organizing a joint workshop to be held in the 2nd half of October in Barcelona.

  • SIG-NOC - PZs presented the aim of SIG-NOC, that is to create a forum where experts from the community exchange information, knowledge, ideas and best practices about specific technical or other areas of business relevant to the research and education networking community. The group has been shaped following TF-CSIRT model and TRANSIT (train the training), but follows a more light-weighted approach.

    There are a set of KPIs included in the charter to evaluate the performances of the group in one year time. RE commented to break out the specific SIG content from the more general part of the SIG template. Staff commented that the specific ToR were indeed an instantiation of a generic template that would be reused in all similar cases. DG was pleased by the involvement of other networks together with the NRENs.

    ACTION: PSz to inform the team the TTC approved the SIG-NOC unanimously 

• Services updates

  • Open Cloud mesh (PSz) - Owncloud is active in the Open Cloud mesh, the initiative to interconnect different owncloud instances. OwnCloud has promised to release the code very soon to the TF.

    In response to a question on whether the installion code cof OwnCloud is tracked, PSz answered that OwnCloud has an agreement with GÉANT; however they also have bigger customers that are handled independently. We do track the installation that are under the agreement. There is also a closed OwnCloud developer group, for those that are doing development on top of OwnCloud.

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