GLIF Secretariat and GLIF Sponsors:
The GLIF secretariat is provided by TERENA. Staff members of TERENA maintain the GLIF
website, organize the GLIF meetings and provide secretariat and management support to the
GLIF Working Groups. The costs of the secretariat are covered by the voluntary sponsorship of a
number of GLIF participants. In recent years, the following organizations have contributed to the
funding of the GLIF secretariat:
AARNet
HEAnet
KISTI
SURFnet
AMPATH
i2CAT
National LambdaRail
TERENA
Calit2 / University of
iCAIR
NORDUnet
TWAREN
California, San Diego
CANARIE
Indiana University
Northwestern
University
of
University
Amsterdam
CERN
Internet2
Pacific
Northwest
University of Illinois
Gigapop
at Chicago
CESNET
JANET (UK)
StarLight
GLIF Events:
The GLIF infrastructure enables advanced applications, such as those demonstrated at the iGrid
2005 Workshop in San Diego, September 200522. IGrid events showcase advances in scientific
collaboration and discovery, by providing a forum for the world's premier discipline scientists,
computer scientists and network engineers to meet and work together in multidisciplinary teams
to understand, develop and demonstrate innovative solutions in a LambdaGrid world.
In addition to Working Group meetings, GLIF organizes one large event per year, known as the
annual LambdaGrid Workshop. The 7th Annual LambdaGrid Workshop was held on 17-18
September 2007 in Prague, Czech Republic. More than 100 people from research and education
networking organizations, universities, research institutes and industry participated. The
workshop was held in the Carolinum, the building that has housed the rectorate of Charles
University of Prague for more than 600 years. It was definitely not built with optical cabling in
mind. Arranging for lambda connectivity and other necessary facilities for GLIF demonstrations
therefore took an enormous effort from CESNET, but this hard work proved very worthwhile.
The Research and Applications Working Group had a particularly overloaded program, testifying
to the growth of lambda applications in various fields of research over the past year. This was
also reflected in the very advanced applications that were demonstrated at the workshop venue.
Particularly spectacular was a demonstration by the CineGrid organization of 4K high resolution
digital video transfer from Japan, The Netherlands and the USA. An experiment in remote
interactive digital film processing also had its world premiere, with partners in Prague, the USA
and Canada all working together to improve the color quality of a specially recorded film. The
quality of 4K digital cinema was staggering: larger and sharper than reality, four times better than
high-definition TV and ten times better than normal television. Further demonstrations of
CineGrid applications took place at the Barrandov film studios just outside Prague, and other
applications were demonstrated at the venue after the workshop concluded.
The Technical Issues Working Group issues addressed a diverse range of topics. Operators of
GLIF Open Lightpath Exchanges (GOLEs) announced the newest updates on equipment and
lambda deployments. This information exchange was complemented by discussions about the
22
http://www.igrid2005.org/
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