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GRID storage access tools installation
The following documentation was developed for the installation of a GRID tools and certificates on an Ubuntu 12.04 system using a bash shell (using .bashrc as a configuration script). We have not tested the installation using csh derivatives but it is to be expected that not all scripts will work. Thanks to Martin van den Akker for providing notes of his installation procedure.
Sites that provide packages and further information on installation of grid middleware on linux based systems:
- Home of the gLite software suite (gLite UI provides a typical client installation)
NB Only the Ubuntu 12 installation described below has been tested by us. Please let us know if you have feedback or if you can contribute instructions on installations in different environments. You might also first need to obtain a GRID certificate.
Installation of software packages
Note: all installations require root permissions.
globus client software
The file transfer tools from the Globus package are needed, most importantly globus-url-copy:
sudo apt-get install globus-gass-copy-progs
voms client software
The VOMS tools for logging in and user account management:
sudo apt-get install voms-clients
Certificates for the Grid Certificate Authorities (CA)
Execute the following commands to install the certificates from the site of the European Grid Infrastructure (EGI) (root permissions are required).
sudo add-apt-repository 'deb http://repository.egi.eu/sw/production/cas/1/current egi-igtf core' sudo apt-get update sudo apt-get install ca-policy-egi-core
srmtools
The SRM tools are needed to communicate with the storage management system.
- Download srmtools
- Extract and install the srmtools, e.g. in
/opt/
This will create a subdirectorysrm
containing the required files.
Note that the srm package may be installed anywhere (e.g. in your home directory). - Set the relevant environment path variables, e.g. in .bashrc:
export SRM_PATH=<Install Directory>/srm
export PATH=$SRM_PATH/bin:$PATH
NB The srm client tools depend on JAVA. There is a known issue with openjava version 7. If you have this version of JAVA installed, or otherwise get JAVA exceptions when running an srm command, please install another JAVA VM. java-6-openjdk is known to work. It is possible to have multiple JAVA VM installations and it is thus not required to replace an existing installation: if the default VM installation does not work with srm, another VM may be configured to be used by setting the following environment parameter:
export JAVA_HOME=/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-openjdk-i386/jre
The JAVA VM used by default in Ubuntu can be selected using the following command:
sudo update-alternatives --config java
Certificate Revocation List retrieval (optional)
The fetch-crl tool retrieves Certificate Revocation Lists.
sudo apt-get install fetch-crl
NB This is not required unless you intend to allow others to access your system by providing their grid certificate.
Additional configuration
VOMSES file for LOFAR
Add the following string for the LOFAR Virtual Organization (VO) to the vomses file.
"lofar" "voms.grid.sara.nl" "30019" "/O=dutchgrid/O=hosts/OU=sara.nl/CN=voms.grid.sara.nl" "lofar"
You can find this string also on the following website https://voms.grid.sara.nl:8443/voms/lofar/configuration/configuration.action in the text block under VOMSES string for this VO
The vomses file should be placed in one of the following default locations: /etc/vomses
, $HOME/.voms/vomses
, $HOME/.glite/vomses
List of certificates for voms.grid.sara.nl.lsc
Put the following strings:
/O=dutchgrid/O=hosts/OU=sara.nl/CN=voms.grid.sara.nl /C=NL/O=NIKHEF/CN=NIKHEF medium-security certification auth
in the file (root permissions required):
/etc/grid-security/vomsdir/lofar/voms.grid.sara.nl.lsc
NB If this step is skipped or nor configured correctly voms-proxy-init
will work but finish with warnings.
Environment (optional)
You may want to provide the following settings in .bashrc
or another initialisation/startup script if the relevant files are not in the default locations (defaults provided below).
export X509_USER_CERT=$HOME/.globus/usercert.pem export X509_USER_KEY=$HOME/.globus/userkey.pem export X509_CERT_DIR=/etc/grid-security/certificates export X509_VOMS_DIR=/etc/grid-security/vomsdir export VOMS_USERCONF=$HOME/.glite
CRL cron job (optional)
You may want to create a cron job to automatically retrieve certificate revocation lists (CRLs) by incoking the fetch-crl tool at regular intervals (at least once a year).