Using Continous Deployment techniques to manage software change at a WLCG Tier-2

Roy, G., Simili, E. , Stewart, G., Skipsey, S.C. and Britton, D. (2020) Using Continous Deployment techniques to manage software change at a WLCG Tier-2. Journal of Physics: Conference Series, 1525, 012066. (doi: 10.1088/1742-6596/1525/1/012066)

Abstract

Continuous Integration (CI) and Continuous Development (CD) are common techniques in software development. Continuous Integration is the practice of bringing together code from multiple developers into a single repository, while Continuous Development is the process by which new releases are automatically created and tested. CI/CD pipelines are available in popular automation tools such as GitLab, and act to enhance and accelerate the software development process. Continuous Deployment, in which automation is employed to push new software releases into the production environment, follows naturally from CI/CD, but is not as well established due to business and legal requirements. Such requirements do not exist in the Worldwide LHC Compute Gird (WLCG), making the use of continuous deployment to simplify the management of grid resources an attractive proposition. We have developed work presented previously on containerised worker node environments by introducing continuous deployment techniques and tooling, and show how these, in conjunction with CI/CD, can reduce the management burden at a WLCG Tier-2 resource. In particular, benefits include reduced downtime as a result of code changes and middleware updates.

• Item Type: Articles
• Status: Published
• Refereed: Yes
• Glasgow Author(s) Enlighten ID: Stewart, Dr Gordon and Roy, Dr Gareth and Britton, Professor David and Skipsey, Dr Samuel and Simili, Dr Emanuele
• Authors: Roy, G., Simili, E., Stewart, G., Skipsey, S.C., and Britton, D.
• College/School: College of Science and Engineering > School of Physics and Astronomy
• Journal Name: Journal of Physics: Conference Series
• Publisher: IOP Publishing
• ISSN: 1742-6588
• ISSN (Online): 1742-6596
• Published Online: 07 July 2020
• Copyright Holders: Copyright © 2020 The Authors
• First Published: First published in Journal of Physics: Conference Series 1525: 012066
• Publisher Policy: Reproduced under a Creative Commons License