SKA data (re)processing, analysis and visualization will be delivered by the implementation of a worldwide network of SKA Regional Centres, which will require seamless access to a distributed web of research objects (datasets, applications, publications, computing resources etc.) provided via federated service management processes and tools for seamless delivery of end-to-end services. The SKA community-specific services offered by the SRCs, will have to integrate with generic capabilities offered by external providers, like identity provisioning offered by the end-user home organizations and generic computing and data management capabilities operated by the national e- Infrastructures supporting the SKA users.

Work Package 6 is providing recommendations and defining best practices on how to:

• Organize federated service management within the ESDC and across multiple SRCs to address the management of the SKA community-specific services.
• Federate the ESDC services with existing e-Infrastructure federated services (Identity Provisioning, Authentication and Authorization, tools for federated service management) to ensure interoperability between community and generic e-Infrastructure services.
• Collect SKA and e-Infrastructures requirements to federate and eventually enhance existing federation services.

This WP will help to establish interoperability between existing e-Infrastructure AAI services, and between management processes and tools adopted by the SKA-relevant e-Infrastructures (see figure above). This activity is being carried out in collaboration with other regions of the world to ensure the federated operations model, and the supporting processes and tools can interoperate with e-Infrastructures and outside Europe: CADC (The Canadian Astronomy Data Centre (CADC) the Canadian Advanced Network for Astronomical Research (CANFAR). It will collaborate with CSIR Meraka Institute (South Africa) and Nectar (Australia).

Data processing execution, access and analysis involving services/resources from the distributed network of SRCs will require interoperable AAI across diverse operational domains. This requires harmonized policies and protocols ensuring transparency to the end user. To address this challenge, this task will:

• Collect the requirements generated by SKA end-users, RSDAs (the service providers) and e-Infrastructure providers.
• Recommend approaches and solutions for a federated AAI infrastructure combining community-specific AAI services and existing e-Infrastructure AAI services
• Propose a SKA trust model for handling of data protection, the operations and the access to ESDC services and resources, and of the research outputs to be shared between the SRCs and the external e-infrastructures

This task includes:

• An assessment of the existing structures and tools operating at a national level and the relationship with the SKA SRCs, and an analysis of current adopted best practices and standards for service management, including IT service management and security incident management.
• An analysis of applicable standards and best practices for federated service management.
• A recommendation of an operational architecture and core set of FitSM processes necessary for running service management in the e-Infrastructures network.

This task is responsible for

• A recommendation of a set of e-Infrastructure tools necessary to support federated ITSM in the ESDC network.
• Piloting of an integrated system of ITSM support tools (monitoring, security monitoring, accounting and incident management) instantiated in different e-Infrastructures supporting the ESDC network