Slate-Project high performance storage system: Terms of service

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Last updated: April 24, 2024

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1. Overview

1.1 General

The Slate-Project high performance storage system is Indiana University's project-focused implementation of Lustre.
This document provides guidelines for the use of Slate-Project, which apply to all Slate-Project Users and the Service Provider.
This document is subject to change and may be modified at any time by UITS Research Technologies (UITS-RT).
Communication will be sent to all Slate-Project Users when modifications to this document are made.
If Slate-Project Users fail to operate within the guidelines of the terms of service, access to Slate-Project may be revoked.

1.2 Terms and definitions

Slate-Project: The Slate-Project file system
Slate-Project Users: All users of Slate-Project, both Slate-Project Owner(s) and Slate-Project Members; Slate-Project Users must agree to the terms outlined in this document
Slate-Project Owner: Slate-Project Project Space requester; considered by UITS-RT as the Slate-Project Owner and a Slate-Project Member; must be the Principle Investigator of a corresponding RT Project
Slate-Project Member: An individual who has requested access to a Slate-Project Project Space that has been authorized by the Slate-Project Owner
Service Provider: The High Performance File Systems (HPFS) group of UITS-RT that manages and provides support for Slate-Project
Slate-Project Project Space: A directory created by the Service Provider for use by Slate-Project Users within Slate-Project; Slate-Project Project Spaces will have the following naming convention: /N/project/PROJECTNAME
No Cost Allocation: The first 15 tebibyte (TiB) of each Slate-Project Project Space; 1 TiB is equal to 2⁴⁰ (1,099,511,627,776) bytes
Billable Allocation: The Total Allocation minus the No Cost Allocation
Total Allocation: The capacity reserve for a Slate-Project Project Space
Subscription Service Agreement (SSA): A document that defines a Billable Allocation, provides an estimate of any monthly charges, and requires Slate-Project Users to read and agree to these terms of service before signing.

2. Service description

2.1 Slate-Project

Slate-Project provides high performance persistent storage to users of IU's research supercomputers.
Slate-Project is a shared resource, serving various types of users, designed to be used for computational activity on high performance computing systems.
Slate-Project Project Spaces are storage allocations created upon request and are primarily intended to support collaborative use for multiple Slate-Project Users.
Slate-Project is operated and maintained by the Service Provider.
With the exception of scheduled maintenance, Slate-Project is generally available 24x7.
Slate-Project participates in the scheduled UITS-RT maintenance window from 7am to 7pm US/Eastern time zone, on the second Sunday of the month. Slate-Project will typically be unavailable during the maintenance period.
If Slate-Project requires extended maintenance or unplanned emergency maintenance, notifications are posted to Status.IU.
Data stored on Slate-Project are not backed up in any way, shape, or form by Research Technologies or any other entity in UITS.

3. Roles and responsibilities

3.1 Slate-Project Users

Slate-Project Users are not allowed to store all data classified as "IU Critical"; only the subset of critical data elements that satisfy the definition of PHI may be stored on Slate-Project.
Slate-Project Users are allowed to store sensitive data, such as electronic protected health information (ePHI or HIPAA-protected data), on Slate-Project in accordance with the following guidelines:
- Secure research data containing HIPAA-regulated PHI on high performance file systems at IU
- UITS Research Technologies systems and services for researchers working with data containing HIPAA-regulated PHI
Slate-Project Users will monitor and respond to email sent to their primary IU email address for official communications from UITS-RT about their Slate-Project Project Space.
Slate-Project Users are responsible for their use of all UITS resources under Appropriate Use of Information Technology Resources (IT-01). Specifically, as regards the use of Slate-Project, Slate-Project Users must not store data that is illegal or protected under state and/or federal regulations. If a Slate-Project User becomes aware of data having been stored on Slate-Project that violates this provision, that person shall contact it-incident@iu.edu.
Slate-Project Users acknowledge and agree that if a catastrophic disaster occurs, resulting in complete data loss, Slate-Project Project Space files will not be recoverable by the Service Provider. Slate-Project Users are responsible for backing up and/or archiving their data.. Slate-Project is not backed up nor archived by the Service Provider. Information about the IU Scholarly Data Archive, which Slate-Project Users can use to archive their data, can be found here: About the Scholarly Data Archive (SDA) at Indiana University.
Slate-Project Users agree to maintain the following permissions and group ownership:
- Group ownership of files and directories will be the Unix Group ID (GID) associated with the Slate-Project Project Space.
- All files and directories in the Slate-Project Project Space that do not have the correct GID will be administratively changed by the Service Provider, and notifications will be sent to the Slate-Project Member owning the data, as well as to the Slate-Project Owner.
- All Slate-Project Users share in the responsibility to ensure that all data contained within the Slate-Project Project Space has the correct GID ownership.

3.2 Slate-Project Owners

The Slate-Project Owner must be the Principle Investigator of a corresponding RT Project.
The Slate-Project Owner accepts any financial responsibility for charges incurred for the Billable Allocation.
Slate-Project Owners are considered account holders; by requesting access for additional Slate-Project Members, the Slate-Project Owner is granting permission for those Slate-Project Members to use Slate-Project Project Space that has been allocated to the Slate-Project Owner.
The Slate-Project Owner is responsible for the administration of data contained within the requested Slate-Project Project Space.
The Slate-Project Owner is responsible for authorizing and revoking Slate-Project Member access to the Slate-Project Project Space.
The Slate-Project Owner has the right to request that UITS-RT administratively change and/or grant permissions to allow read-write access to project data contained within the Slate-Project Project Space that is inaccessible to the Slate-Project Owner or that has been abandoned by former Slate-Project Users.
If a Slate-Project Owner separates from the university and does not specify a successor, the Service Provider will discontinue access to the Slate-Project Project Space until such time that a Slate-Project Owner is designated according to Privacy of Electronic Information and Information Technology Resources (IT-07). A new SSA will need to be completed once a new Slate-Project Owner is designated.
A change in Slate-Project Owner will require a new SSA to be signed.

3.3 Slate-Project Members

Slate-Project Members agree to grant read-write access to the Slate-Project Owner for all data in the Slate-Project Owner's Slate-Project Project Space that has been assigned the Slate-Project Member's User ID (UID) throughout the lifetime of the data's existence in the Slate-Project Owner's Slate-Project Project Space.
If at any time a Slate-Project Member's data in the Slate-Project Owner's Slate-Project Project Space become inaccessible to the Slate-Project Owner, the Service Provider may, at the Slate-Project Owner's request, administratively grant the Slate-Project Owner read-write access to said data.
At the Slate-Project Owner's discretion, Slate-Project Members may be granted full access to all project data, including the ability to remove other individual's data inside the Slate-Project Project Space.
Acknowledgment of this agreement by the Slate-Project Member fulfills the "Permission granted by owner" requirement for access described in Procedure 1, section A of Privacy of Electronic Information and Information Technology Resources (IT-07).
Slate-Project Members can request a copy of data that has been assigned their User ID (UID) if the Slate-Project Member becomes separated from the Slate-Project Project Space. The Service Provider will make a best effort to fulfill the request.

3.4 Service Provider

The Service Provider will administer the Slate-Project system using best practices for security, performance, and availability. In particular, strict adherence to the privacy provisions outlined in Privacy of Electronic Information and Information Technology Resources (IT-07) will be maintained as it is on all UITS systems.
The Service Provider will monitor all email to the address hpfs-admin@iu.edu for all operational communication from Slate-Project Owners and Slate-Project Members concerning the Slate-Project storage system and their use of the service.
The Service Provider will provide support to Slate-Project Users on UITS-RT's recommended tool set for the storage and access of Slate-Project Project Space data.
The Service Provider reserves the right to suspend a Project User's access to the Slate-Project Project Space in Slate-Project in the following non-exhaustive circumstances:
- As required by law or regulation
- As the Service Provider determines in its sole discretion is necessary to protect Slate-Project from unauthorized access or damage to its content
- As the Service Provider determines in its sole discretion that the Slate-Project User's use of Slate-Project is illegal, infringes upon the intellectual property rights of a third party, or otherwise violates the restrictions, representations, or warranties herein
- As the Service Provider determines in its sole discretion that the Slate-Project User's use of Slate-Project may subject Indiana University to civil or criminal liability
- For the purpose of Emergency Problem Resolution as defined in section 4.a. of Privacy of Electronic Information and Information Technology Resources (IT-07).

4. Data purge

There is no regular automated purge of Slate-Project. In the case of projects that are solely No Cost Allocations, UITS-RT may request a report on the Slate-Project Owner's use of the system and a list of work products (such as papers, presentations, and/or software published). If the Slate-Project Owner ignores these requests, the Service Provider reserves the right to suspend access to all Slate-Project data.
When a Slate-Project User's account is disabled by UITS, the Slate-Project User's data residing on Slate-Project will be removed by the Service Provider after 180 consecutive days of account deactivation.
All active Slate-Project Members in a Slate-Project project will be notified via email when a Slate-Project Member's account becomes disabled or when a Slate-Project Member is removed from the Slate-Project project.

5. Hours of support

The Service Provider will monitor all email to the address hpfs-admin@iu.edu for all operational communication Monday through Friday, 8am-5pm, with the exception of university holidays.
The Service Provider will respond to email inquiries within one business day.
During unexpected services outages, the Service Provider will work after business hours to the best of their ability to restore service.

6. Billable Allocations

Approval

The Service Provider will evaluate requests for Billable Allocations and has the option to refuse requests.
Final approval by the Slate-Project Owner's fiscal officer will be required before the Billable Allocation is available for use on Slate-Project.
The Billable Allocation term begins the on the first of the month, after the following events:
- The SSA is signed and accepted
- Approval by the Slate-Project Owner's fiscal officer
- The Billable Allocation is available for use on Slate-Project

Calculation

Billing is calculated on the first of the month, for that month, based on the published rate for Slate-Project Space and the Billable Allocation.
- Billable Allocation multiplied by the Published Rate results in the amount the Slate-Project Owner will be billed monthly.
The published rates for Slate-Project space can be found here: Rates for UITS services.
The Slate-Project Owner and the Slate-Project Owner's Fiscal Officer will be notified in email of all rate changes.

Interval

Billing will occur after each month, thus in arrears for a single month's Billable Allocation, unless there are extenuating circumstances.

Mechanism

The Service Provider will bill via the university ID billing system.

Changes

To increase, decrease, or terminate the size of a Billable Allocation, a request must be sent to hpfs-admin@iu.edu from the Slate-Project Owner.
Increases and decreases to the size of a Billable Allocation are subject to the Approval (6.1) and Calculation (6.2) sections above, and will require a new SSA to be signed.

Suspension

All Slate-Project Users and the associated Fiscal Officer will be contacted in the event of non-payment.
Non-payment for a given Billable Allocation will result in a suspension of all access to the associated Slate-Project Project Space.
Slate-Project Project Spaces that have been in suspension for 180 days will be eligible for termination and immediate data removal.

Termination

Requests to terminate a Billable Allocation should be sent to hpfs-admin@iu.edu from the Slate-Project Owner.
Termination notifications will be sent to all Slate-Project Members and the Fiscal Officer from hpfs-admin@iu.edu.
Access to Slate-Project project data will be revoked for all Slate-Project Members 30 days after processed termination.
The final billing will occur at the beginning of the month, following an accepted termination request.
All project data will be deleted 180 days after project termination.

7. Service retirement

UITS-RT reserves the right to retire the system at the end of the system's life cycle. Slate-Project Users will be provided at least 180 days' notice before any decommissioning.