CANARIE working to increase visibility as it begins preparations for next funding cycle

Demonstrating value proposition crucial

The CANARIE research and education network may be close to 20 years old but in many respects it's still at the ground floor of a revolution in R&D that is radically altering the ways in which researchers of all persuasions conduct their work. As the arm's length organization approaches the mid-way point of its current five-year funding agreement with Industry Canada, its central challenge requires a combination of maintaining cutting-edge broadband services and old-fashioned evangelism to bring advanced networking to an ever expanding range of research activities.

Long regarded as a trailblazer in the global world of high-speed broadband research networks, CANARIE is continuing that tradition with a bold move into the networking side of environmentally sustainable computing or Green IT — seeking ways to reduce the environmental footprint of research networking activities.

Yet, for all its programming and networking support, the organization suffers from relatively low visibility — a problem CANARIE officials are the first to admit. They are moving aggressively on several fronts to engage a wider range of research activity and assist the provincial network nodes (ORANs — optical regional advanced networks) in providing the linkages, applications and middleware required to serve both the existing and potential user communities.

"We have to go beyond certain communities … Research is no longer a single-party sport. It's becoming a team effort and teams are distributed. It's data-rich research now and the amount of data that's being crunched by machines has increased exponentially," says Bujold, a former assistant DM with Industry Canada's science and innovation sector and interim president of the Canadian Space Agency in 2008.

eliminating suitcase science

Bujold points to the next generation of beam lines at the Canadian Light Source synchrotron in Saskatoon which will be accessed and utilized remotely, introducing a new research paradigm that dramatically reduces so-called suitcase science — the costly and time-consuming necessity of travelling to the CLS to conduct research.

Canada's major science facilities tend to be the largest users of the CANARIE network and the network is built to accommodate them. But the highest rate of growth is occurring in areas not typically associated with research networking, namely the social sciences and humanities (SSH). In the UK, the greatest growth is in SSH and a similar trend is being detected in Canada as disciplines such as history see the benefits of moving and analyzing large amounts of data.

A major element of CANARIE's activities involves assisting in the development of the computing platforms used by researchers. The highly popular Network Enabled Platforms (NEP) program launched a second competition this year While the winners have been selected, they won't be announced until contract negotiations are complete.

"The real challenge is getting people to use what you've built. The HPC (high-performance computing) community is facing the same problem to a certain degree. It serves as an underpinning for why CANARIE should be involved at the layers above the infrastructure, in support of the development of applications or middleware. That's where you see CANARIE coming into its own." —

CANARIE president & CEO Guy Bujold

"It's a very modest investment in the grand scheme of things ... but you're getting a lot of leverage,"says Bujold. "That's a challenge everyone recognizes. How do we leverage existing investments by doing what's necessary to support other groups that can actually use the network? There's got to be some kind of impact and that's why we're so keen on NEP II."

NEP II's original $15-million budget was reduced to $12 million to allow for the launch of a Green IT pilot project. While not part of its funding agreement with Industry Canada, Bujold says the department has been supportive of the introduction of a dramatically different element into the CANARIE mandate.

The strong working relationship between CANARIE and Industry Canada places the organization in good stead as it prepares to approach government for refunding when its current agreement expires March 31/12. But Bujold and his management team are under no false illusions that getting government to agree to a new five-year mandate is going to be easy.

In 2007, the government allowed CANARIE's refunding to run down to the wire, causing widespread concern within the user community and insecurity amongst CANARIE staff as contracts with vendors came close to expiring (R$, November 2/06). To assist in the complex task of negotiating renewal, CANARIE created the position of chief strategy officer and hired Hélène Joncas to ensure that the delays encountered in 2007 are not repeated.

"CANARIE in the past has had some challenges when it comes to funding ... My role is to focus (renewal efforts) by working with Guy and the team and ensure it doesn't happen again," says Joncas. "The CANARIE network underpins so many of the activities that Canada has already invested in. If CANARIE is not around, everything falls apart and I don't think there's that appreciation (in government) now."

Preparations are underway to develop a new five-year strategic plan that will find favour with government. Bujold says he's employing a two part approach of demonstrating that past and current investments are being well spent while convincing government of the importance of making a decision for funding beyond 2012 in a timely manner.

"I would not suggest for a moment that (Industry Canada officials) don't understand it, but do they understand it to the point of recognizing the urgency of a decision that can give some kind of assurance that we're going to be in the game? That's really the key," he says.

To assist in its task of assessing a CANARIE bid for future funding, Industry Canada commissioned a study by Hickling Arthurs and Low (HAL) to explore options for CANARIE's evolution over the long term. That includes examining international models for supporting cyberinfrastructure in light of the rapidly changing nature of the research enterprise. While the HAL report is complete, Industry Canada has not released it publicly.

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