Author: Tobias Rühle

ZDV participates in the development of intelligent adaptive storage systems

The ZDV is part of the European joint project ADMIRE, which has set itself the goal of developing a new adaptive storage system for high-performance computers. In cooperation with fourteen institutions from six countries, ADMIRE aims to significantly increase the running time of applications in the areas of weather forecasting, molecular dynamics, turbulence simulation, cartography, brain research and software cataloging.

The research team at the ZDV "Efficient Computing and Storage" focuses on the so-called ad-hoc file systems, which are controlled by the overall ADMIRE system for applications if required. This should significantly increase the overall I / O performance for applications and relieve the central parallel file systems (such as Luster). The GekkoFS file system, a ZDV in-house development, is used as the basis. This is adapted to the requirements of modern applications in high-performance computers so that the file system provides the highest possible I / O performance and can react dynamically to decisions made by the overall ADMIRE system.

The ADMIRE project at a glance © ADMIRE

Additional information: https://www.uni-mainz.de/presse/aktuell/13932_ENG_HTML.php

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New version of the video conference system bbb.rlp.net

The new version BigBlueButton 2.3 was launched on Monday, May 10th. The open source software is the basis for the video conference system bbb.rlp.net, which is available to all colleges / universities and schools in Rheinland-Pfalz and is hosted by the ZDV.

During the further development, the BigBlueButton development team took into account the suggestions and wishes of teachers. Better interaction with the participants was important to them. New in version 2.3 are functions such as: an independent “raise hand” button, optimized and new survey options and the random selection of participants.

The Digital Teaching Competence Team has created an overview of the new functions.

With the update to 2.3, the system architecture was fundamentally renewed. This ensured that all components will continue to be looked after by a security team in the future. The reprogramming of central components has also significantly improved performance and scalability. The ZDV team managed a smooth transition by replacing the BBB servers one after the other. In this way, failures could be prevented and users of the video conference system did not experience any impairments.

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ZDV increases password security

The Data Center (ZDV) has been carrying out an additional security check with the database https://haveibeenpwned.com/ for every new password and password change since January. This collects the hashes of the passwords* from password databases that are circulating on the Internet and checks whether the selected password was published in the event of a previous data leak. If this is the case, users will receive a message on the JGU account page that the password entered was part of a data leak and must not be used.

If the password is changed under Windows using the key combination CTRL + Alt + Del or in such a case, Ctrl + Alt + Del "Change password" appears that the password does not meet the complexity rules. A more specific message cannot be displayed as the ZDV has no way of adapting it.

To ensure that the hashes of the passwords* are not passed to a third party or website, the ZDV copied the entire database directly from the provider and runs it on its own server.

Further information on creating secure passwords: https://www.en-zdv.uni-mainz.de/account-change-of-password/

*Technical background

The password itself (the plain text) is not checked. Only the user should know this. Instead, the so-called hashes of the passwords are examined. These are character strings of a certain length that are determined with the help of mathematical processes. This process can be described as a type of coding and takes place relatively quickly in the direction of password -> hash. However, the inversion (hash -> password), i.e. calculating back a hash, is almost impossible due to the complexity and the enormous computing effort.

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