The grid is an open source technology developed specifically for academic research. It is funded by research institutions and free at point of use.
Clouds are commercial services owned and provided by individual businesses. Users pay to use the service as and when they need to.
The European Grid Infrastructure (EGI) is a federation of resource providers set up to deliver sustainable, integrated and secure computing services to European researchers and their international partners.
EGI.eu is an organisation established on 8 February 2010 to coordinate and manage the infrastructure (EGI) on behalf of its participants: National Grid Initiatives (NGIs) and European Intergovernmental Research Organisations (EIROs).
EGI.eu is a foundation recognised by Dutch law and headquartered in Science Park Amsterdam, the Netherlands.
National Grid Initiatives or Infrastructures (NGIs) are organisations set up by individual countries to manage the computing resources they provide to the European e-Infrastructure (EGI). NGIs are EGI's main stakeholders, together with CERN and EMBL (two European Intergovernmental Research Organisations or EIROs).
Each NGI contributes a number of sites to the grid infrastructure. NGIs are responsible for the maintenance and running of the sites they operate.
The resources coordinated by EGI are free at point of use: individual users do not have to pay to use the grid infrastructure. Participating countries and institutions contribute to the common costs of running the infrastructure. The individual resource providers (NGIs) fund and maintain the hardware in their own countries.
Slovak Grid infrastructure
Video presentation EGI and e-Infrastructures in Europe:
www.youtube.com/europeangrid
EGI and e-Infrastructures in Europe.flv
Institute of Informatics of the Slovak Academy of Sciences organized meeting aimed to proposal of national grid infrastructure project Slovak Grid on February 21, 2008 in Bratislava.
* Map will be actualized according to on-going negotiations.