The international Data Mover Challenge (DMC) is a competition that is run once every two years and it aims to bring together experts from industry and academia in a bid to test their software and solutions for transferring huge amounts of research data. DMC seeks to challenge international teams to come up with the most advanced and innovative solutions for data transfer across servers located in various countries that are connected by 100Gbps international research and education networks.
The challenge focuses on optimising point-to-point data transfers between sites – a crucial step forward in advancing research collaboration and sharing. Participants from all over the world will compete by deploying the best software tools on Data Transfer Nodes (DTNs) that are set up within existing international networks across the globe.
The DMC competition is a key event of the SupercomputingAsia (SCA) conference series. The winning team will be announced at the SCA24 Conference. The winning team’s leader will be invited to attend SCA24 from 19-22 February 2024 in Sydney, Australia, for an award presentation and solution showcase*.
Eligibility
This Data Mover Challenge is open to all organisations, companies, research institutions, academia, researchers, post-graduate students and undergraduate students.
Representatives of all partnering organisations for the challenge shall not participate as team members for this competition.
Registration is open from now till 25 June 12 July 2023.
The Challenge
DMC 2023 will run from 1 August to 30 October 2023. Participating teams will be given 5 days to deploy and run data transfer tests based on given scenarios:
- 3 days to set up software: Monday SGT (UTC+8) 0000Hrs – Wednesday SGT (UTC+8) 2359Hrs
- 2 days to run the data transfer and demonstrate software to judges: Thursday SGT (UTC+8) 0000Hrs – Friday SGT (UTC+8) 2359Hrs (Statistics and results will be captured)
Judging Panel
The competitors will be assessed and selected by an international panel of judges comprising domain experts and professionals in the field of networking and data transfer. Members of the judging panel for DMC23 include:
- Andrew Howard, Cloud Systems Manager, National Computational Infrastructure (NCI), Australia (Chief Judge)
- Marcos Felipe Schwarz , RNP, Brazil
- Francis Lee Bu Sung, Associate Professor, School of Computer Science and Engineering, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore
- Tim Chown, Network Development Manager, Jisc, UK
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
For more information about DMC23, please contact datamoverchallenge@nscc.sg.
*Award presentation and solution showcase may be done virtually depending on prevailing pandemic circumstances.
