StratusLab Collaboration

The StratusLab Collaboration aims to provide a complete, open-source cloud distribution that allows resource centers to deploy their own public or private “Infrastructure as a Service” (IaaS) cloud infrastructure.

The collaboration’s motto is “Darn Simple Cloud”. We aim to provide a cloud solution that is both simple to install and simple to use. Where possible, we build on existing software and technologies to minimize and to simplify our own code base.

At the same time, we strongly believe in providing high quality, well tested code; we use agile software development processes and tools to achieve this.

History

StratusLab started as an informal, academic collaboration between several partners involved in the EGEE series of grid projects in 2008. The initial aim of this collaboration was to investigate if the new cloud technologies (primarily Amazon Web Services) could be used as a platform for running grid services. The collaboration concluded that is was indeed possible and further, was convinced that cloud technologies would be an important platform for scientific computing.

The collaboration subsequently grew into a more formal collaboration that proposed a European-level project to build an open-source cloud distribution suitable for running grid services. This proposal was accepted and StratusLab, as a project co-funded by the European Commission, ran from June 2010 to May 2012. During this period, the foundations of the current StratusLab cloud distribution were built.

The StratusLab collaboration continues to maintain and to develop further this cloud distribution as an open collaboration of institutes and individuals. The four principal institutes currently participating are CNRS (France), SixSq (Switzerland), GRNET (Greece), and Trinity College Dublin (Ireland).

Joining the Collaboration

The collaboration welcomes new collaborators, both institutions and individuals. All it takes is a willingness to participate constructively in the collaboration and to provide contributions consistent with the licenses used by the collaboration. Contact us at contact@stratuslab.eu to become a member.

Communication

The collaboration coordinates its activities primarily through a common mailing list: stratuslab-devel@googlegroups.com. Developers are expected to solicit feedback and to announce significant changes on that list. There is also a weekly teleconference on Thursdays at 11:30 (Paris) to allow more interactive discussion of progress and problems.