Research Article

A Grid workflow infrastructure

  1. Dieter Cybok*

Article first published online: 13 DEC 2005

DOI: 10.1002/cpe.998

Issue

Concurrency and Computation: Practice and Experience

Concurrency and Computation: Practice and Experience

Special Issue: Workflow in Grid Systems

Volume 18, Issue 10, pages 1243–1254, 25 August 2006

Additional Information

How to Cite

Cybok, D. (2006), A Grid workflow infrastructure. Concurrency Computat.: Pract. Exper., 18: 1243–1254. doi: 10.1002/cpe.998

Author Information

  1. Department of Computing, Imperial College London, 180 Queen's Gate, South Kensington Campus, London SW7 2AZ, U.K.

*Department of Computing, Imperial College London, 180 Queen's Gate, South Kensington Campus, London SW7 2AZ, U.K.

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 19 JUL 2006
  2. Article first published online: 13 DEC 2005
  3. Manuscript Accepted: 27 APR 2005
  4. Manuscript Revised: 3 APR 2005
  5. Manuscript Received: 28 MAY 2004

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Keywords:

  • workflow management;
  • workflow language;
  • workflow engine;
  • Grid Workflow Execution Language;
  • Grid computing;
  • e-Science;
  • OpenGrid Services Architecture;
  • Globus Toolkit;
  • Business Process Execution Language for Web Services

Abstract

In this paper we propose a Grid workflow infrastructure, which serves as the base for specifying and executing collaborative interactive workflows within computational Grids. The infrastructure is based on the Open Grid Services Architecture (OGSA) and leverages the concepts of the Business Process Execution Language for Web Services (BPEL4WS). Using OGSA enables the exploitation of advanced Grid features such as factories, lifecycle management and notifications. Leveraging BPEL4WS to a Grid enabled workflow language has the advantage that basic workflow functionalities, which are similar for Grid and Web services, do not have to be developed again. The result is a state-of-the-art Grid workflow infrastructure that was developed within a relatively short period. The main building blocks of the infrastructure are the specification of the Grid Workflow Execution Language (GWEL) notation and the implementation of a Grid workflow execution engine, using Globus Toolkit 3 (GT3) technology, for processing e-Science specific workflows specified in GWEL documents. The workflow engine itself is a high-level Grid service, hence automatically Grid aware, which can be used within any GT3 environment. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

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