Panlab Seminar Report - Testbed Federation in Europe

Panlab presented its major results during the seminar that was held on 13-14 May 2008, in Dinard, France (Bretagne).

Panlab was launched as a  Specific Support Action (SSA) under FP6 to provide the grounds for the implementation of a Pan-European laboratory for next generation networks and services. The main purpose of the seminar was the presentation of Panlab project results as well as to provide a forum for open discussion on best-practice examples of testing services in Europe and requirements on a long-term sustainable testing infrastructure. The seminar, was targeted at all interested in testbed federation, particularly senior R&D managers and experts who provide or use network and service testing facilities. Around 50 participants attended the seminar.

Local support for the seminar organisation was provided by Thomson R&D France and the Media and Networks Cluster “Pôle Images et Réseaux”. The Media and Network Cluster includes 154 organisations and focuses among others on the facilitation of testing approaches in the networked and media area, as stated by Ms. Christiane Schwartz, President of the Cluster, in her keynote speech.

Panlab Project Results

The Panlab approach is based on the concept of federation of distributed interconnected test laboratories and testbeds that enable usage of required platforms, networks and services for broad interoperability testing. The coordination of resources and access to the testing services will be controlled by a central Panlab organisational entity. A generic roadmap, created within the project, outlines how and when the PANLAB organisation and federated test-bed concept will be implemented, from the prototype and initial operation to full-scale PANLAB operation, considering a time-frame until 2015 and beyond.

The infrastructure of the pan-European Laboratory consists of testbeds, integrated by Teagle, a dedicated web-based tool for federated testing. The Teagle tool embraces a set of web services that enable customers to express their testing needs and get feedback on where, how and when a required federated testing can take place. Besides technical aspects, the Panlab project considered a legal framework for the future PANLAB organisation and concluded that a non-profit organisation is the most suitable solution for its legal structure, where also provision of commercial testing services can be ensured.

European Testing Infrastructure – Requirements and Development

As stated by Georgios Tselentis (European Commission), two aspects of the Future Internet Research and Experimentation (FIRE) are considered as priorities in upcoming European research; Experimentally driven advanced research and Building European experimental facilities. The necessity for development of the testing infrastructure was stressed also by representatives of European Technology Platforms, the Eureka Celtic Cluster, SME’s, and further potential users of testing services.

A number of speakers representing various organisations and projects, developing different kinds of testing facilities, presented their recent achievements and ideas for the future. Presentations from Panlab Seminar are available for download on the Panlab project website.

Main Conclusions

It was outlined that the establishment of a PANLAB organisation as an entity, in charge of facilitating the European testbed infrastructure, will ensure sustainability of numerous testing facilities developed by industry and collaborative projects, giving opportunity for a wide community to explore and further use them, in order to improve experimentally based R&D activities. Thereby, economical advantages in providing and using the federated testing facilities is recognised by both big industry and SME’s. Raised confidentiality and IPR issues related to testing of new approaches in external test-beds seem to be possible to be overcome by appropriate rules which will be established in PANLAB.

Important characteristics of the Panlab concept, its openness and neutrality were emphasised and acknowledged. From a technological point of view, the proposed incremental development of the Panlab concept and test-bed federation is seen as an important factor. Finally, it was concluded that Panlab services should be available world-wide, in order to take advantage of a global cooperation by all interested parties.