Speaker
Description
Over the years, CERN activities and services have been increasingly relying on commercial software and solutions to deliver core services, often leveraged by interesting financial conditions based on recognizing CERN statuses like academic, non-profit, research, etc. Once installed, well spread, heavily used, the leverage used to attract CERN service managers to the commercial solutions tends to disappear and is replaced by real business models and licensing schemes, that are considered to be unaffordable on the long term.
As a matter of fact, the CERN nature of openness targets delivering the same service to every type of CERN user, from Staff people to Users of the scientific resources. As a result, a high number of licenses is required to deliver services to everyone, and when traditional business models on a per user basis are applied, the costs per product can be huge.
More importantly, the trendy Cloud approach enterprises are now focusing on are introducing a new risk of lock-in on the data this time. It is always easy to import data in a cloud system, but always difficult to get data out. In addition, software vendors deliver easy and integrated cloud access for all their offered services, facilitating the life of end users when choosing storage.
The MAlt project objective is to target if possible Open Source products, to deliver services inclusive to all CERN community. The project’s principles of engagement are to deliver the same service to every type of CERN user, avoid vendor lock-in to decrease risk and dependency, keep hands on the data and address bulk use cases.
| Desired length | 20 |
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