PaaSage

Project Goals

Because cloud infrastructures have not been standardized, which often makes porting an existing application into a cloud platform very complex and regularly requires expert knowledge. This is where the PaaSage project begins. The focus is on the development of a platform that eliminates interoperability problems. This intention is reflected in the project name PaaSage, which is based on the terms “platform as a service” and “passage” and thus signals that the use of cloud services is simplified for the user. The possibility of a simple, platform-spanning implementation and use of cloud applications is of great interest especially for the European economy.

The overarching task of the PaaSage project is to provide a development environment and a platform for creating and running cloud services, regardless of the diverse cloud structures of different providers. PaaSage has four objectives:

• The development and standardization of an open modeling language for cloud systems. This language, regardless of the underlying infrastructure, will allow the development of services for the cloud.
• Providing a development environment to support the above-mentioned modeling language.
• Providing modules and connectors that enable services to be run in different cloud infrastructures.
• The definition of metadata for the characterization of services and the recording of their performance.

GWDG’s role in the Project

The GWDG is involved in a number of work packages, the focus of which is in the fields of requirements analysis, connection to cloud infrastructures, integration and testing. Here the GWDG as a provider of various cloud services as well as through cooperation in various standardization activities is predestined to integrate the platform developed by PaaSage into existing solutions and to test them under production conditions. With the help of the GWDG, in particular with the connection of the cloud middleware developed in PaaSage to the OpenStack management software, three applications from the project could be realized completely. Especially the porting of industrial applications shows that the GWDG cloud is also suitable for the scale-out of industrial applications.

Project Partners

PaaSage is a European research consortium consisting of 19 partners. Its members include operators of cloud services, application developers, research facilities and technology transfer agencies.

Project coordination is the responsibility of ERCIM - the European Research Consortium for Informatics and Mathematics, Biot, France.

Additional Information

Wieder, Phillip, Launching the EU Project PaaSage - A € 8.4m Investment for Bridging Clouds, in: GWDG-Nachrichten 11/2012, p. 9