ipf 1.8.2

The Information Publishing Framework

# access-ci-org/ipf %VER%-%REL% # README

## Overview

The Information Publishing Framework (IPF) is a generic framework used by resource operators to gather and publish dynamic resource information in [GLUE 2 serialized format](http://www.ogf.org/documents/GFD.147.pdf). IPF was used by the TeraGrid, XSEDE, and XSEDE 2 programs, and is currently being used by the ACCESS-CI program to publish high-performance compute cluster information.

IPF gathers and publishes information using simple workflows. These workflows are defined using JSON (see the etc/workflows directory) and steps in the workflows are implemented as Python classes. Each step in the workflow can require input Data, can produce output Data, and can publish Representations of Data. A typical workflow consists of a number of information gathering steps and a few steps that publish representations to files or to remote services (e.g. REST, messaging).

Workflow steps specify what Data they require and what Data they produce. This allows IPF to construct workflows based on partial information - in the case where there are not steps that produce the same Data, an entire workflow can be constructed from a single publish step and its required input Data. At the other extreme, workflows can be exactly specified with specific steps identified and the outputs of steps bound to the inputs of other steps. A typical workflow (e.g. GLUE 2) specifies what steps to include but lets IPF automatically link outputs to inputs of these steps.

Workflows can run to completion relatively quickly or they can continuously run. The first type of workflow can be used to run a few commands or look at status files and publish that information. The second type of workflow can be used to monitor log files and publish entries written to those files. Workflows are typically run periodically as cron jobs. The program libexec/run_workflow.py is for executing workflows that complete quickly and the program libexec/run_workflow_daemon.py is used to manage long-running workflows. The daemon

## License

This software is licensed the Apache License Version 2.0.

## Installation

Quickstart instructions are in [docs/Quickstart.md](docs/Quickstart.md). More comprehensive instructions are in [docs/INSTALL.md](docs/INSTALL.md).

## Support Information

This software is currently maintained by the ACCESS CONECT project.

The source is maintained in the [ACCESS-CI GitHub](https://github.com/access-ci-org/ipf). ACCESS-CI resource providers and other members of the ACCESS-CI community are encourage to contribute bug fixes and improvements.

Software bugs may be reported as GitHub issues. ACCESS-CI related support requests should be submitted through the ACCESS-CI ticket system.

## Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the TeraGrid, XSEDE, FutureGrid, XSEDE 2, and ACCESS CONECT projects under National Science Foundation grants 0503697, 1053575, 0910812, 1548562, and 2138307.