USAG meeting October 29th 2009

Summary and conclusions

• The new shift table will be operational as of January 2010. The ROCs participating in the restricted rota will be the winners of the EGI bid, pending final approval by the ROCs themselves. The ROCs in question are: DECH (Germany) , IT (Italy) , and SWE (Spain-Portugal).
• The strategy note should be soon finalized and distributed to relevant parties.
• The user support assessment will be transformed, the permanent item in the agenda will remain and the focus will shift to the most outstanding ticket and an action will be assigned to the ROC with the most tickets to clean the backlog or address the issues.

• The draft strategy note
• The new TPM model final as concluded from the 2009/06/09 SA1 f2f meeting at CERN.
• The draft TPM OLA.

Attendance

GGUS - Helmut Dres, Guenter Grein, Torsten Antoni
CERN - Diana Bosio, Maria Dimou (chairperson)
UK/I - Claire Deveneux
IT   - Riccardo Brunetti, Tiziana Ferrari

Apologies:
CE   - Jan Kmunicek
UK   - John Kewley

Notes by Diana

Agenda:

1. Agenda approval
2. Comments on the summary from the September 23rd USAG@EGEE'09 meeting [here].
3. Continuous user support assessment as required by MSA-1.6 via the weekly escalation reports Do we need to continue doing this?
4. Can we release the model document [here]?
5. Are there more comments on the User Support Strategy note.
6. After the sessions at EGEE'09 on the future of User Support do we need more USAG meetings on Strategy?
7. New GGUS development: savannah #108708 site-ROC association on the ticket submission form.
8. Review Action List. All actions are now done as per [point 7 of these notes.]
9. A.O.B.
   1. In addition to the imminent time-plan (appended) for Regional Dashboards (follow EGEE'09 presentation by Cyril , a nagios-ggus interface savannah #104188 and savannah 110701 new ticket type 'nagios' now enter testing period. Development is based on GGUS interface document for Grid Messaging.
10. Next meeting date: Thursday 3 December 2009 @ 9:30 CET to bridge the October-January gap! (NB! Unusual date. Algorithm violation!)

Discussion:

1. Agenda: Approved.
   
2. Comments on the summary from the September 23rd USAG@EGEE'09 meeting [here]: notes approved.
   
3. Continuous user support assessment as required by MSA-1.6 via the weekly escalation reports Do we need to continue doing this?
   • VO tickets older than one month will be systematically closed.
   • Shall we close the item from permanent agenda?
     Torsten: doing it in this meeting did not really help a lot. Maybe we could do it in another meeting, maybe the SA1 coordination meeting.
     Maria: What is the threshold on the escalation report for which a unit should be reported? Answer: The treshold seems to be based on the number of tickets that the unit has which appear long-standing.
     ETICS: They do not agree that the ticket should be dealt with in a timely manner as some of the issues take very long to solve. An agreement has been reached with Alberto with approval by Maite: the tickets will not be left 'assigned' (there was a misunderstanding of what the status assigned meant) will be moved to in progress, and savannah link in ticket. Unsolved in not acceptable in this case for ETICS.
   Conclusion
   • It was decided not to exclude long standing tickets by default or exempt ETICS from the escalation reports.
   • It was also decided to adopt a compromise: the reports will not be discussed in the USAG meeting in detail. But we will keep on going to the various meetings to report the tickets:
     • to EMT for middleware tickets,
     • to WLCG for the VO tickets,
     • to SA1 Coordination for the ROC tickets.
     We report to USAG only if there are issues arising. The item will remain in the agenda as a reminder.
   • At each USAG meeting we will have a "monthly top ticket" in the USAG meeting to single out the most outstanding ticket
   • The ROC with the most long standing ticket or with the most tickets will have an action to clean the back-log.
   Actions resulting
   • ACTION1 on ROC Italy: to look at the tickets and clean up the backlog.
   • ACTION2 on Maria: ETICS tickets forgotten again, many of them in status 'assigned' for several weeks.
   
   
4. Can we release the model document [here]?
   • Writing of documentation is not in this version of the document. Document to be updated according to the comments in Barcelona and then released.
   • As for the request of a Companion Book shorter than the manual, where one would find described procedures to be followed by the TPM in more technical details than what described in the model, request presented in Barcelona by Tiziana, and renewed here, Diana thinks the TPM wiki would satisfy this request, where more details on how to perform the duties should be described and mantained. Hence, Maria points out that it would be the responsibility of the TPM also to mantain of the TPM wiki for peers TPM.
   • FAQ production should also be monitored. As a matter of fact, this already happens as reports on FAQ produciton already exist.
   
   
   • Maria: At the last meeting we decided to stay with the full shift until the end of the year. Is it still the case? What are the TPM teams for EGI?
   • Tiziana: EGI on TPM duties. They should be Italy, Germany and Spain/Portugal as unfunded effort. Torsten: I thought they were Germany and Netherlands.
   • Torsten: it is not possible to make it with only 2 teams without a corresponding shifting of effort. The original decision at the SA1 coordination meeting was to do it with 4 teams.
   • Maria: but volume is not much, number of tickets is low.
   • Tiziana: For Italy is fine, we can begin in January if we are chosen for TPM in EGI.
   • Torsten: I will have to double check with Germany if there is no additional funding. I suspect there will be difficulties.
   Conclusion
   As a function in the document, maintenance of the documentation under the TPM section in the GGUS documentation pages, with specific reference to the TPM wiki and monitoring of the FAQ creation.
   Actions
   • ACTION3: Maria to update the doc to reflect the fact that documentation is also one of the duties of the TPM and release
   • ACTION4 on Maria: check with Stephen Newhouse who are the winners of the TPM EGI bid and let USAG know.
   
   
5. Are there more comments on the User Support Strategy note.
   • Maria: I can provide content for the currently empty section on TPM main concerns and issues. For instance thoughts on if it will be easier to chase tickets now that teams are on duty ever other week, Or what will happen with the rest of the duties.
   • Tiziana: Triage effort was reduced to 1 FTE.
   • Tiziana: This group has to describe the duties, the structure of the support, the concerns, to understand when the transition can start. We can only provide input, we cannot change the funding distribution.
   • Tiziana: The introductory part is very useful, section 2. Diagrams in figure 2 and 3. A suggestion: update the diagram to include 3rd line support to complete the structure. Figure 3 for regional VOs: second line comes from the EGI directly. In my understanding the second line middleware support is provided centrally.
   Actions
   • ACTION5: Diana update version number in the Strategy Note doc.
   • ACTION6: Maria to confirm that the TPM effort was reduced to 1FTE.
   • ACTION7: Tiziana to send a paragraph on middleware support and INSPIRE issues,
   • ACTION8: make 3 pictures on the ticket workflow: one for tickets to ROCs, one for tickets to VOs, one for tickets to middleware.
   
   
6. After the sessions at EGEE'09 on the future of User Support do we need more USAG meetings on Strategy?
   • Maria: Let us finalize the note, give it to SA1 and ask input on what to do to.
   • Diana is to obtain the EMI proposal and reflect it in the Strategy Note.
   Conclusion
   Update and finalize the document and present the Strategy Note on 17/11 at the SA1 coordination meeting.
   
7. New GGUS development: savannah #108708 site-ROC association on the ticket submission form.
   
8. Review Action List [go to point 7 of these notes].

   20090402-1
   Review the 18 points of 'RESPONSIBILITIES' in section 4 of the current version 0.6 of the TPM OLA.
   New TPM model candidates (.IT, NE, .DE, CE, SWE)
   Done

   20090528-1
   Clarify with the UMD team how they plan to interface with GGUS.
   Passed from Ales to Diana on 20090827
   Done

   20090528-2
   Experts of other mw stacks to gather information required for the strategy note.
   Passed from Ales to Diana on 20090827
   Done

   20090528-6
   Send comments to Guenter on the GGUS interfaces' document index, in particular on doc. 9993 and 9994.
   Interface developers
   To be presented at the Tuesday pm EGEE'09 session on regional helpdesks as decided on 20090827. Done

   20090827-1
   Tuesday pm @ EGEE'09: Present 1 slide/ROC on GGUS interface method and update rel. doc. on https://gus.fzk.de/pages/ggus-docs/interfaces/docu_ggus_interfaces.php.
   ROC representatives
   Done

   20090827-2
   Wednesday am in USAG @ EGEE'09: Present the plan for fulfilling the TPM function.
   TPM candidates.
   Done

   20090827-3
   Wednesday pm @ EGEE'09: Find VO representatives to present the User communities' requirements and methods.
   Frederic (NA4) and Maria (LCG)
   Done

   20091029-01
   Clean the backlog of tickets
   ROC Italy
   Pending

   20091029-02
   ETICS tickets forgotten again, many of them in status 'assigned' for several weeks.
   Maria
   Pending

   20091029-03
   Maria to update the doc on TPM new model to add that Documentation is also one of the duties of the TPM and release
   Maria
   Pending

   20091029-04
   check with Stephen Newhouse who are the winners of the TPM EGI bid let USAG know.
   Maria
   Done

   20091029-05
   Update version number in the Strategy Note doc.
   Diana
   Pending

   20091029-06
   Maria to confirm that the TPM effort was reduced to 1FTE.
   Maria
   Done

   20091029-07
   Tiziana to send a paragraph on middleware support and INSPIRE issues.
   Tiziana
   Pending

   20091029-08
   Make 3 pictures on the ticket workflow: one for tickets to ROCs, one for tickets to VOs, one for tickets to middleware.
   Torsten
   Pending

   20091029-09
   Change the name of the Appendix 'user support in EGEE'
   Diana
   Pending

   20091029-10
   Send the section on Main concerns and issues
   Transferred from Maria to Torsten
   Pending

   20091029-11
   Reflect in the Strategy Note the EMI proposal
   Diana
   Pending

   20091029-12
   Present the Strategy note at the SA1 coordination meeting
   Diana
   Pending

   20091029-13
   Communicate to Diana and Torsten the comments to the strategy note.
   All
   Pending

9. A.O.B.
   1. In addition to the imminent time-plan (appended) for Regional Dashboards (follow EGEE'09 presentation by Cyril , a nagios-ggus interface savannah #104188 and savannah 110701 new ticket type 'nagios' now enter testing period. Development is based on GGUS interface document for Grid Messaging.
   
   
10. Next meeting date: Thursday 3 December 2009 @ 9:30 CET to bridge the October-January gap! (NB! Unusual date. Algorithm violation!)