NOVA : the Cloud Computing Platform

OpenStack

OpenStack is a set of open source software that provides a solution for deploying and managing cloud computing infrastructures.

NOVA: GRICAD’s Cloud Computing platform

Nova is GRICAD’s OpenStack platform for on-demand non-permanent virtual machines.
Accessible via a web interface or APIs, the platform lets you manage VMs, their network and all Cloud Computing resources.

Nova project in Grenoble

The NOVA project provides a cloud computing infrastructure (IaaS) for EPE UGA establishments.
The funders are : CNRS, Grenoble INP, Inria, UGA, research or teaching projects, Mathrice.
The platform is installed in the Grenoble datacenter.

Nova platform features

• on-demand supply of virtual servers,
• numerous options available (CPU, RAM, disk capacity, etc.),
• OS available :
  • Debian, Ubuntu, Cirros, etc.
  • any OS you can upload to your project,
• quota and management per project,
• management via web interface, command line interface (CLI) and API (python, go, c, etc.).

Each project is allocated a set of resources (cores, memory, disk space, network) that users can use to create and manage VMs as they see fit.

Accessing the service

To access GRICAD’s Nova cloud computing service, you must have a Perseus account and apply for a project.

1. Consult PERSEUS documentation
2. How do I access the Nova platform?

Warning, a Nova project makes Cloud-type resources available to users, so you will need to specify at least the following when creating your Perseus project:

• Number of VMs
• Quantity of CPU
• Quantity of RAM
• Quantity of disk space

Use cases

Any use that does not require hosting or long-term storage.

• Testing and validation : Laboratories, Experiments, Pre-production, Mock-ups (NbGrader)
• Training and education
• Data processing
• Computing: HPC / HTC
• GPU development
• Continuous integration (Runner gitlab)
• etc.