september 2006 ict-iss – genève 1 ict-iss 2006 et-cts (eudcs) report jean-françois gagnon...

September 2006

ICT-ISS – Genève 1

ICT-ISS 2006ET-CTS (EUDCS) Report

Jean-François Gagnon

Director, Network and Voice OperationsChief Information Officer Branch

Environment Canada .

2121 Trans-Canada HighwayDorval, Québec

Canada, H9P 1J3514-421-4658

[email protected]

September 2006


ET Members & ET Meeting participants

Jean-François GAGNON Canada Hugues AYINA ASECNA

Hiroyuki ICHIJO Japan Matteo DELL'ACQUA ECMWF

Ian SENIOR Australia Jose Mauro de REZENDE Brazil

Xiang LI (Ms) China Guillaume AUBERT ECMWF

Remy GIRAUD France David BROWN NCAR

Ilona GLASER (Ms) Germany Akihiko NAKAZONO Japan

Wai-man MA Hong Kong Hisashi NAKANO Japan

Elham FARMAN (Ms) Iran Takahiro SAITO Japan

Kevin ALDER New Zealand Yoritsugi OHNO Japan

Cemal OKTAR Turkey Nobue KISHI (Ms) Japan

Phil CHAMBERLAIN UK Tatsuya KIMURA Japan

Allan DARLING USA Jean-Michel RAINER Secretariat

September 2006


ET-CTS Tokyo 25-28 April 2006 Participants

September 2006


ET-CTS/EUDCS Discussions, Conclusions and Recommendations

• REVIEW OF THE CURRENT STATUS OF IMPLEMENTATION OF TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS AT GTS CENTRES

• RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS

– TCP/IP procedures on the GTS (IP address scheme & IPv6)– TCP/IP based services (Email & web)– File naming convention

• RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR DATA COMMUNICATION AND DATA ACCESS PROCEDURES

– OPeNDAP, NetCDF, HDF

• GUIDANCE FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF DATA COMMUNICATION FACILITIES (GTS & INTERNET) AT WWW CENTRES

– Guide on use of FTP and FTP servers at WWW centres– Guide on Information Technology Security (ITS) at WWW centres– Guide on Internet Practices– Guide on Virtual Private Networks (VPN) via the Internet between GTS centres

September 2006


REVIEW OF THE CURRENT STATUS OF IMPLEMENTATION OF TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS AT GTS CENTRES

• Reports from:– RTH TOKYO (Nakano San)– RTH Offenbach (I. Glaser)– NMC Ankara (C. Oktar)– RTH Melbourne (I. Senior)– RTH Beijing (Li X.)– RTH Exeter (P. Chamberlain)– IMTN Region III (J.M.de la Rezende)– NMC Hong Kong (W.Ma)– Asecna (H Ayina)– New Zealand (K. Alder)– RTH Tehran (E. Farman)

• The ET noted some progress in implementation of TCP/IP procedures around the various regions especially for smaller sites (major centers had already reported conversion to TCP/IP procedures at previous meetings).

• Internet experience is good and reports on reliability are reassuring.• It is noted however that ideally, Internet is still not recommended as unique method of data

acquisition for mission critical activities.• It was also noted that security is an important concern and requires efforts and strong

commitment by all. It was commented that it is easier to secure FTP connections than sockets.• It was noted that while collection of bulletins via Email often proves to improve communications in

some areas, it also requires a strong quality control at the collecting center as the collected messages often contain several typing or format mistakes.

September 2006


RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS

• TCP/IP procedures on the GTS– Work plans and deliverables

• Finalize a new IP address scheme and migration plan to resolve the issue of IP addresses for GTS links, in close association with the centres that are the main users of the current IP addresses (mid 2005).

• Study IPv6 and the possibility of registering IPv6 addresses for WMO purposes (End of 2006).• It is expected that a review of Attachment II.15 should be achieved (preferably before July 2006).

– I. Senior reported successful tests of IPv4 "unnumbered" feature on Brisbane, Melbourne and Tokyo links when using static routing. This feature can help in situations where official addresses can not be assigned to a link. Difficulties were encountered with BGP routing, but it is believed that this is just a configuration problem that should be easy to fix.

– Reports on the progress of IPv6 deployment in the industry were a bit disappointing. Although the number of registered addresses is growing, there is also an apparent decline in official IPv6 deployment activities in the world. For example, earlier plans for IPv6 readiness in the Japanese government in 2008 are not so precise anymore.

– There was some discussion on the possibility of registering a block IPv6 addresses for use by WMO member countries. No expert could offer advice on how registering bodies would accept such a request nor if such a block of addresses would actually be useful. The IPv6 addressing schemes should be further studied in order to answer this question.

– In the short term, we have options that are more attractive than IPv6 to propose as a solution to the IP address issue.

– The Sept 2005 "provisional arrangement for IP addresses" was reviewed including recent additions by R. Giraud. The ET agreed on the concepts and principles of the arrangement and would include this information in a review of Att II.15. (http://www.wmo.int/web/www/ISS/Guides/IP-addresses-GTS_Prov2005sept.doc)

September 2006


RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS (cont’d)

• TCP/IP based services– Reports of Email and web data collection over the web were discussed

(Turkey, Hong Kong, New Zealand, plus a few words from Australia and UK).

– Again, it was noted that while collection of bulletins via Email often proves to improve communications in some areas, it also requires a strong quality control at the collecting center as the collected messages often contain several typing or format mistakes.

– It was noted that the New Zealand implementation can also forward messages to the AFTN automatically.

– The Secretariat inquired if the Hong Kong and New Zealand implementations of web ingest could be made available to requesting countries as it is the case for the USA. No official response has been received from these countries. It is expected that the implementations are tightly linked to other internal procedures and systems.

– Web templates were demonstrated (password protected) at the meeting by the presenters. These demonstrations might be made available to requesting bodies.

– The ET concluded that the Email and web procedures information in the current WMO documentation is adequate at this time.

September 2006


RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR TCP/IP PROCEDURES AND APPLICATIONS (cont’d)• File-naming conventions

– work plans and deliverables• b. Finalize the general new file naming convention, in collaboration with the ET-OI (End of 2005).• CBS identified the need for a method to assign unique identifiers to several elements and that a common approach

amongst the different ETs. It also supports that the generation of these unique identifiers should be made as close as possible to the creation of the elements.

– R. Giraud introduced a proposal from MeteoFrance to generate unique identifiers. The proposal favours introducing a readable format in the identifier, since fields such as the TTAA will not be descriptive enough in the future.

– The ET also discussed a proposal provided by Steve Foreman before the meeting on this topic. This proposal also meets the CBS needs, but would yield more abstract identifiers compared to the MeteoFrance proposal.

– It was noted that the French proposal is already being adopted by DWD and SIMDAT.– It was therefore felt that the French proposal should be adopted.– The proposal was therefore further developed as part of the review of Att II.15 and is currently available as

a standalone file at http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/Doc31(1)_filenaming.doc– Japan provided a report of their implementation of the file naming convention. They have noted that the file

extension ".bin" may not describe the file type enough, and added information in the filename freeformat to that effect (for example by specifying a ".grib" or “.bufr” extension). This has to be further refined.

– The issue of the use of upper-lower case letters in the file naming convention was also discussed at length. It was concluded that the ET would support case insensitivity as it is widely accepted and implemented in the industry (for example email addresses and URLs). In particular it could be recommended to use the "canonical form" of file names when processing. In this manner it would be expected that:

• File names be saved in their original form as received (with any combination of upper-lower case characters)• Files would be saved with lower case characters only for internal processing, comparison, name searches, etc.• Files would be retransmitted with the original saved name to preserve the upper lower case differences.• This keeps the benefits of readability of upper lower case throughout the systems, but provides case independence for

processing and reference.

This precision as yet to be added in the file naming convention.

September 2006


RECOMMENDED PRACTICES FOR DATA COMMUNICATION AND DATA ACCESS PROCEDURES

• Work plans and deliverables– Draft recommended practices for data-communication and data access procedures, in particular OPeNDAP,

NetCDF and HDF (Q3 2006).

• D. Brown from NCAR presented netCDF, HDF5, OpenDAP and how this relates to TIGGE at NCAR (NCAR, ECMWF and CMA are archive sites for TIGGE).

• netCDF (network common data form) is an interface for array-oriented data access and a library that provides an implementation of the interface. The netCDF library also defines a machine-independent format for representing scientific data. Together, the interface, library, and format support the creation, access, and sharing of scientific data.

• HDF5 is the storage layer used by netCDF.• OpenDAP (Open-source project for a network data access protocol) makes local data accessible

to remote locations regardless of local storage format.• With respect to TIGGE, it was noted that the daily file transfer requirements when the 3 sites are

running could be very large (~200Gbytes/day).• It was noted that netCDF and HDF5 was used by several organisations in the USA, but as well in

Australia and Brasil and others. NetCDF in particular seems to have wide acceptance in the general field of environmental sciences.

• Although the ET noted with appreciation what these projects and formats were, it was difficult to arrive at a conclusion regarding their use for access procedures in the context of WMO. This discussion should probably follow a more in depth study of the requirements of WIS. In terms of data communication, the formats do not pose any particular problems per say. The volume of data is of more concern.

September 2006


GUIDANCE FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF DATA COMMUNICATION FACILITIES (GTS & INTERNET) AT WWW CENTRES

• Reference (excerpt from EC-LVII)Appreciating the guidance material being developed by CBS for the operational use of the Internet with minimized operational and security risks, and its importance for smaller NMHSs, the Council requested CBS to actively pursue this task, and urged NMHSs to contribute their experience and expertise.

• Work plans and deliverables– Finalize the Guide on use of FTP and FTP servers at WWW centres, the Guide on

Information Technology Security (ITS) at WWW centres and review the Guide on Internet Practices as necessary (End of 2005).

• Guide on use of FTP and FTP servers at WWW centres– A. NAKAZONO presented the work done on “the Guide on use of FTP and FTP servers at

WWW centres”. Much progress has been achieved in this guide which now contains all the essential elements on the topic. However, Mr Nakazono indicated the lack of experience on Windows (and Internet Info Server, IIS) based servers and requested help from other volunteers to complete this part of the work. After discussion, it was recommended to drop the IIS description, and favour a popular free FTP server for Windows. R Giraud will also communicate minor comments to Mr Nakazono after the meeting and possibly offer help for suggesting an acceptable free Windows FTP server.

– P. Chamberlain also noted that the guide proposed to use the /active and passive” FTP options in a way different to the current use of the FTP server implemented at the UK Metoffice.

– The guide has been reviewed by Mr. A. Nakazono’s supervision and is available at http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/WMO_Guide_Use_FTP-Sep13.doc

September 2006


GUIDANCE FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF DATA COMMUNICATION FACILITIES (GTS & INTERNET) AT WWW CENTRES (cont’d)

• Guide on Information Technology Security (ITS) at WWW centres– JF Gagnon provided an overview of the Guide on ITS at WWW centres,

highlighting the importance for IT Security in a networked environment. It was also noted that security will be a growing concern, especially with the new RMDCN and eventually new IMTN.

– This guide also required completion. Several sections were incomplete. Section 5.5 was further developed to emphasize the need for detection and actions to be taken when events are detected.

– The ITS guide was reviewed and completed under Ms I. Glaser’s supervision and is now available at http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/WMO_Guide_ITS-rev2006-07-19.doc

• Guide on Internet Practices– The guide was reviewed after the Tokyo meeting under Mr. W. Ma’s

supervision and is available at http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/WMO_Guide_Internet_Practice-rev2006-09-14.doc. No major changes were introduced, but several editorial changed were performed as well as an update of references.

http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/WMO_Guide_Internet_Practice-rev2006-09-14.doc

http://www.wmo.int/web/www/TEM/ICT-ISS2006/WMO_Guide_Internet_Practice-rev2006-09-14.doc

September 2006


GUIDANCE FOR IMPLEMENTATION OF DATA COMMUNICATION FACILITIES (GTS & INTERNET) AT WWW CENTRES (cont’d)

• Guide on Virtual Private Network (VPN) via the Internet between GTS centres

– Work plans and deliverables• Update and refine as required the current Guide on Virtual Private Networks (VPN) via

the Internet between GTS centres.

– C. Oktar presented an overview of VPN usage in Ankara. VPN is used there both for regional offices and for secure remote access. It is not the main means of communication for all the sites, but a complementary or backup solution.

– After discussion on the topic, it was noted that the Guide on ITS should warn against the possibility of a remote access PC being a gateway between a secure network (centre’s network to which the PC is connected via VPN tunnel) and the internet (to which the PC may allow access as well). It should also explain a method to guard against the potential threats in that case.

– It was also pointed out that the current guide on VPN does not address the issue of remote access at all. This should be reviewed.

– Although, Mr. M. Del’Aqua offered to forward further documentation on the VPN experiments in RA VI after the meeting, his move back to MeteoFrance form ECMWF has left this work undone. This review is not critical, but is still an action to complete.

September 2006


Review of Attachment II.15 (Use of TCP/IP on the GTS)

• Several discussions in ET-CTS pointed to the need for a review of Attachment II.15.

• A draft ATT II.15 rev3 was started but not completed– The foreword, introduction, chapters 1 and 2 and a new annex (High

Level TCP/IP Topology and TCP/IP Data Flows) are reviewed• objective of making the ATT II.15 more of a TCP/IP reference rather than

just a migration document• Include due reference to WIS as required• These updates can probably be approved for ATT II.15 rev 3 as is.

– Chapters 3 to 5 were not reviewed as a whole, but some material is provided:

• IP address scheme (part of Chapter 3)• File naming (part of Chapter 4)• Secure GTS connection over the Internet using VPN (Annex 4)• This information can probably also be added to ATT II.15 as is.• More review is required for Chapters 3 to 5. It is unclear if this can be

completed and recommended officially by ET-CTS before CBS Ext 06.

September 2006


Thanks

• I wish to thank ET-CTS members and the secretariat (JM Rainer) for their combined efforts in making this work possible

September 2006


Summary of ad-hoc working groups and document responsibilities

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