This page contains information on GSI support in the cloud scheduler.

GSI support in the cloud scheduler allows a user to authenticate using his/her grid certificate when submitting a job to the cloud scheduler. The cloud scheduler will then use these credentials for authenticating the Nimbus workspace creation and workspace deletion.

Enabling GSI support in the cloud scheduler will also put some restrictions on the VM which will only allow jobs from the owner of that VM to be started on it. In other words, jobs owned by user B will not be started on a VM owned by user A. The rationale behind this is to prevent access to a delegated proxy on a VM to other users.

The GSI support is still in prototype mode and is available under the myproxy-integration-dev branch.

Requirements:

• A cloud scheduler codebase with GSI support
  • checkout from myproxy-integration-dev branch
• A working CA is required to sign the dummy VM host certificate.
  • Done. Running on alto.cloud.nrc.ca
• A working Globus Toolkit is required on the host running the cloud scheduler.
• The user requires a valid grid certificate (x509)
• The VM images must have a recent version of the condor startup scripts (with generic local condor config support)

Install NEP-52 root CA package

On the cloud scheduler host:

$ wget --no-check-certificate https://wiki.heprc.uvic.ca/twiki/pub/Restricted/CsGsiSupport/globus_simple_ca_ebd3459c_setup-0.20.tar.gz
$ gpt-build ./globus_simple_ca_ebd3459c_setup-0.20.tar.gz <flavor>
# gpt-postinstall
# $GLOBUS_LOCATION/setup/globus_simple_ca_ebd3459c_setup/setup-gsi

Request dummy host certificate for VM instances

On the cloud scheduler host:

$ mkdir VM-host-cert
$ cd VM-host-cert
$ grid-cert-request -dir . -host NEP-52_VM_instance -ca

For the time being, the NEP-52 CA is hosted on alto.cloud.nrc.ca. Send the above certificate request to Andre.Charbonneau@nrc-cnrc.gc.ca Install the signed certificate in the VM-host-cert directory created above.

Configure GSI Authentication in Condor

In the condor config on the cloud scheduler host:

SEC_CLIENT_AUTHENTICATION = REQUIRED
SEC_CLIENT_AUTHENTICATION_METHODS = GSI
SEC_CLIENT_ENCRYPTION = REQUIRED
SEC_CLIENT_ENCRYPTION_METHODS = 3DES
GRIDMAP = /etc/grid-security/grid-mapfile.condor

This will enable both authentication (GSI) and encryption for clients connecting to this condor server. Do not forget to create the grid mapfile specified in the above configuration.

For some unknown reason, my grid mapfile must contain an entry for the host cert of cloud scheduler (vm129 in my case), such as:

"/C=CA/O=Grid/CN=host/vm129.cloud.nrc.ca" condor@vm129.cloud.nrc.ca

(Replace vm129.cloud.nrc.ca with the hostname of your cloud scheduler host.)

Note that if uses are not listed in the grid mapfile, these users will sill be authenticated and authorized to look at the condor info (READ operations), but will not be allowed to submit any jobs.

In order to the changes to take effect, you need to restart condor:

# /etc/init.d/condor stop
# /etc/init.d/condor start

To test that GSI authentication is actually enabled, try to run the condor_q command without a user proxy. You should get an error message, such as shown below:

$ grid-proxy-destroy
$ condor_q

-- Failed to fetch ads from: <132.246.148.29:8080> : vm129.cloud.nrc.ca
AUTHENTICATE:1003:Failed to authenticate with any method
AUTHENTICATE:1004:Failed to authenticate using GSI
GSI:5003:Failed to authenticate.  Globus is reporting error (851968:28).  There is probably a problem with your credentials.  (Did you run grid-proxy-init?)

Then create a proxy and try the command again. The condor_q command should work now.

Configure CA roots in cloud scheduler

We need to specify which CA root certificates and signing policy we need on our VMs. This is done by adding the following to the cloud scheduler config file:

ca_root_certs: /etc/grid-security/bffbd7d0.0,/etc/grid-security/certificates/ebd3459c.0
ca_signing_policies: /etc/grid-security/bffbd7d0.signing_policy,/etc/grid-security/certificates/ebd3459c.signing_policy

Configure VM dummy host certificate in cloud scheduler

cert_file: /home/andre/work/cloud-scheduler/VM_host_cert/hostcert.pem
cert_file_on_vm: /etc/grid-security/hostcert.pem

key_file: /home/andre/work/cloud-scheduler/VM_host_cert/hostkey.pem
key_file_on_vm: /etc/grid-security/hostkey.pem

Configure the nimbus grid-mapfile on the cloud servers

Make sure that the authorized users DN are added to the Nimbus grid mapfiles on the cloud server that this user is allowed to use. For example, on alto.cloud.nrc.ca, this is in the following file:

/usr/local/nimbus/services/etc/nimbus/nimbus-grid-mapfile

Testing

Restart the cloud scheduler

Create a user proxy (full legacy). Make sure it's lifetime will cover the duration of the job.

$ grid-proxy-init -old [-valid HH:MM]

Add x509 proxy info in your job description

In order to use GSI authentication, you need to specify your user proxy in your job description. This is done using the x509userproxy classad attribute. For example:

x509userproxy = /tmp/x509up_u20200

Submit the job

$ condor_submit <job-description-file>

Credential renewal

NOT IMPLEMENTED YET Since proxy renewal has not been implemented yet, the users will have to create proxy that have a long enough lifetime to cover the execution of their jobs.

-- AndreCharbonneau - 2010-08-30