Tutorials/CloudSim/launch constellation

Introduction === This tutorial covers:
 * Launching and terminating constellations in the cloud.

Prerequisites === This tutorial assumes that you have a Google email account that has been granted access to a running CloudSim instance. See CloudSim setup and installation tutorial.

Background ===

Open your console CloudSim console, as explained in the administration tutorial.



This is what the CloudSim console looks like for admin users when no simulations are running. The top widget section allows you to launch a variety of constellation configurations. Different configurations are available depending on the choices of:
 * Cloud service provider
 * Region (depending on the cloud service provider)
 * Configuration (some configurations are not available in all regions)

The lower section, constellations, shows the running instances.

CloudSim is capable of launching multiple machines that work together during a single simulation campaign. CloudSim uses the term constellation for this concept. In CloudSim, Machines can only be launched within the context of a constellation, so it is possible to encounter constellations that only contain a single machine.

Launching a constellation ===

In the upper widget, select the following options from the drop-down menus:


 * Cloud service provider: `Amazon Web Services`
 * Region: select the region that's closest to you (for lower latency)
 * Configuration: `Simulator-stable (g2.2xlarge)`

Then click the "Deploy" button. After a few seconds, you should see a new section appear inside the "Constellation" section. Here's what happens then:


 * A constellation with a unique name is created. It contains one simulator machine.
 * A new virtual machine with GPU is started with Ubuntu 12.04 precise
 * X and OpenGL are configured for the GPUs (with the current NVidia drivers)
 * Packages for VPN, ROS, Gazebo and DRC simulator are installed
 * The machine reboots

The whole process can take up to 20 minutes. Once done, the machine state should indicate "running" with a blue dot. The graph shows latency measured between various machines. It is updated periodically.



Terminate the constellation and its machines ===

Press the "Terminate" button on the top left corner of the Constellation section. Within a few seconds, you should see the Machine state dot turn to orange and the "running" will change to "shutting down".

Once the state of every machine indicates "terminated", the constellation will not appear if the browser window is refreshed.

Next ===


 * Managing Simulation tasks