All, The OpenFabrics Enterprise Working Group is pleased to announce the creation of the OpenFabrics Enterprise Distribution (OFED). This was approved today by the Board of Directors.
OFED is a distribution of InfiniBand software that includes, or is a superset of, the OpenFabrics 1.0 release, and adds other additional software outside of the scope of the OpenFabrics release, such as MPI. This development work will happen completely in the open in the Enterprise Working Group. To join this mailing list, please subscribe at: http://openib.org/mailman/listinfo/openfabrics-ewg The major reasons for this distribution are: 1) Need to unify vendors' snapshots of OpenFabrics release for interoperability; 2) Need to package software outside the scope of the main OpenFabrics release; 3) Need to coordinate vendors' bug fixes and prevent divergence. For frequently asked questions, a FAQ is included below. Please let us know if you have any additional questions. Regards, Shawn Hansen Chair, Enterprise Working Group Cisco Systems [EMAIL PROTECTED] -------------------------- Frequently Asked Questions -------------------------- Q: What is the Enterprise Working Group? The EWG is a group of hardware vendors that will sell products based on OpenFabrics. The purpose of this group is to coordinate how to provide a single commercially supportable distribution of OpenFabrics software to their customers that guarantees cross-vendor interoperability. Q: Why is OFED required? - Enterprise customers will have solution-level requirements that are outside the scope of the 1.0 release, such as the distribution of MPI stacks, support for pre-2.6.16 kernels, etc. The goal of OFED is to address this need. Without OFED, each InfiniBand vendor would create their own distribution of OpenFabrics to accomplish this goal, and may not be interoperable. Q: Does OFED compete with the OpenFabrics release? - No, there is only one OpenFabrics release. OFED is a distribution that includes the OpenFabrics 1.0 release. The OpenFabrics 1.0 release and OFED share the same user-level code (libraries, management utilities, etc.) The code for both is taken from the 1.0 branch. Q: Is OFED development happening in the open? - Yes, OFED uses the OpenFabrics bugzilla for bug reporting, and all discussions can be viewed on the Enterprise Working Group mailing list. All OFED development is done on the 1.0 branch under the ibed directory. Anyone can access release candidates, test them, observe bugs and discussions, report bugs, and comment. Q: How does OFED differ from the OpenFabrics release? - The OpenFabrics release contains only user-level code, while the OFED distribution also adds InfiniBand kernel modules that are under OpenFabrics development, including modules that are not part of the kernel (like iSER, RDS, and SDP). - OFED will include two MPI packages that are not part of Open Fabrics: OSU MPI and Open MPI. - OFED is packaged for end-user installation. - OFED supports distribution with older kernels (e.g. Redhat EL4 up2) Q: What is the software release process for OFED and how does it relate to the OpenFabrics release? The release build is done using the following method: 1. Any module that is already in the kernel will be taken from the git tree that is targeted for next kernel release 2. Kernel modules that are not in Linux kernel will be taken from openFabrics SVN trunk or in extraordinary cases, from SVN contrib. 3. All user space code is taken from the 1.0 branch. OFED group will make sure the right patches from the trunk are updated to the branch. 4. MPI: Open MPI - Provided by OpenMPI developers. MVAPICH - Based on OSU release. Both tarballs are placed in OpenFabrics web site. 5. OFED build & install scripts: all relevant scripts are placed under a specific directory for OFED release under the 1.0 branch. 6. Back port patches: patches directory will be also under the OFED directory in the 1.0 branch. The release process: The release coordinator will build the release candidate (OFED-rcX) and publish it on OpenFabrics (approximately every 2 weeks). Each OFED vendor is responsible to test the components under his ownership. Bugs are reported through bugzilla and fixes are provided to the general list. Q: What is the anticipated release schedule? Mid-May Q: What components will be included in OFED and how is this decided? - Components will include: - HCA driver - mthca - HCA driver - ipath - Core - IPoIB - SDP - RDS - SRP initiator - iSER initiator - OSU MPI - Open MPI - uDAPL - OpenSM - Diagnostic tools - Performance tests The decision to include components is based on customer demand and level of robustness and stability. Components will be categorized in one of three ways: 1) Basic: GA components that installed in a typical installation. 2) Add-on: Components that can be installed optionally. 3) Technology preview: Components where quality level is not GA, but can be used by customers for technology development. Q: When bugs are found, how will they be fixed? - Fixes to release candidates are coordinated by the OFED release coordinator and maintainers in a controlled fashion. Each bug found is first fixed on the trunk, and then merged into the release branch. - Patches will be made available as RC updates, and fed back to OpenFabrics SVN continuously. - Availability of patches will not be gated by acceptance of patches into OpenFabrics SVN. - Urgent bug fixes can be directly delivered to customers by the distros or vendors, but are rolled into a standard release as quickly as possible. The goal is to ensure that fixes are standardized and make it to the next general release. _______________________________________________ openib-general mailing list [email protected] http://openib.org/mailman/listinfo/openib-general To unsubscribe, please visit http://openib.org/mailman/listinfo/openib-general
