https://doi.org/10.1140/epjp/i2012-12020-4
Regular Article
Do regions matter in ALICE?
Social relationships and data exchanges in the Grid
1
Dpt. of Sociology, University of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
2
Units of Mental Development Psychiatry, Department of Mental Health and Psychiatry, University Hospitals of Geneva, Geneva, Switzerland
3
CERN, Geneva, Switzerland
* e-mail: gil.viry@unige.ch
Received:
27
June
2011
Revised:
19
December
2011
Accepted:
15
January
2012
Published online:
16
February
2012
This study aims at investigating the impact of regional affiliations of centres on the organisation of collaborations within the Distributed Computing ALICE infrastructure, based on social networks methods. A self-administered questionnaire was sent to all centre managers about support, email interactions and wished collaborations in the infrastructure. Several additional measures, stemming from technical observations were collected, such as bandwidth, data transfers and Internet Round Trip Time (RTT) were also included. Information for 50 centres were considered (about 70% response rate). Empirical analysis shows that despite the centralisation on CERN, the network is highly organised by regions. The results are discussed in the light of policy and efficiency issues.
© Società Italiana di Fisica and Springer, 2012
