I saw on OOD 2.0 anouncement, that cloud could be supported:
The project develops Open OnDemand 2.0, an open-source software that enables access to high-performance computing, cloud, and remote computing resources via the web, and lower the barriers to access HPC systems.
Is this actually planned? Any ETA?
It would be really nice to be able to run/connect/manage e.g. openstack instances through ondemand web gui (openstack gui is worse than terrible) and bascially, it does not differ much to run slurm/pbs job or vm.
Our current focus is on adding to OnDemand a Kubernetes adapter by July and Cloudy Cluster adapter by a date @jeff.ohrstrom could talk to, and there are discussions about adding an adapter to ISSQ’s Sid cloud platform but that timeline is undetermined. We also did some work on an OpenStack adapter but that work was stalled due to some decisions that still need to be made and a lack of sites to collaborate with.
With any adapter to a cloud resource there are still two problems:
how do you configure that cloud resource to make it available as a resource to utilize to unprivileged users, say from a login node
how do you alter OnDemand to utilize this resource
The one site we collaborate with who has an OpenStack instance is interested in using OnDemand strictly as a tool for provisioning VMs for long term use to specific users and providing streamlined access to those VMs, where the users are granted root access and can install whatever software they want and manage as they will. The typical use case was a professor setting up a persistent VM with some software and accounts so students could access and use during a class. Such a VM may exist for months at a time, with the user turning on and shutting down periodically.
This model is very different from using OpenStack as a cloud burst tool for doing interactive work, where the VMs may be ephemeral or even hidden to the user.
One thing that is not clear is whether OnDemand should utilize a service account to interact with the OpenStack API, or whether API credentials should be provisioned automatically for every OnDemand user. We are taking the latter approach with our Kubernetes implementation.
Do you have any interest in participating in or supporting the development of an OpenStack adapter? It isn’t on our timeline in the near term but I’ll make note of you in the draft pull request so we remember when we pick this up.
@efranz We have interest in supporting the development of an OpenStack adapter. We have a small OpenStack cluster at our site that we are opening up to general use soon. I would be interested in exploring the first use case you mentioned, where OnDemand is used as a provisioner of persistent VMs.
my idea about resources - I guess it is pretty much the same as runnnig slurm/pbs job. You specify some more things than cpu, ram; add starting image, network and you could be done. You run start and your VM appears running. I do not see any fundamental problem here.
Naturally, you cannot utilize everything that cloud provides, but running simple VMs should be possible.