NeCTAR Research Cloud Core Services (Work Package 1A)

Since its launch in 2012 the NeCTAR Research Cloud has been supported by a range of Core Services operated out of the University of Melbourne. These core services are of an applied / operational nature, however given the innovative federated & research-led nature of the Research Cloud, significant effort and ingenuity is required to increase resiliency, improve usability, and to further develop these tools according to the needs of the research community. By introducing a test facility, this activity will initiate and drive the adoption of CI/CD (operating tools for devops) for digital research infrastructures. The work package will re­visit what it means to be a part of the federation and a node of the Research Cloud, ensuring that procedures such as upgrades, architectures, etc. are consistent across the federation. In doing this, we will achieve a more robust, consistent and cost­ effective cloud service for the Australian research community, whereby some percentage of the operations of the OpenStack digital service is performed nationally, and the rest at the Research Cloud Nodes. Finally, this work package adds Monash University and the NCI as partners of Core Services alongside the University of Melbourne.