File Transfer Service (FTS)

Technology from the
Science Mesh Data Source

FTS is an open source software for reliable and large-scale data transfers. It provides easy user interfaces for submitting transfers: Python CLI, Python Client, WebFTS and Web Monitoring. Checksums and retries are provided per transfer and it is a flexible tool due to its multiprotocol support (Webdav/https, GridFTP, xroot, SRM). It also allows parallel transfers optimization to get the most from network without burning the storages.

FTS is used by many research organizations in the High Energy Physics domain and outside

Key components

  • WebFTS - Simplifying power: WebFTS is a web interface that provides a file transfer and management solution in order to allow users to invoke reliable, managed data transfers on distributed infrastructures.
  • FTS-REST - Python API: FTS-REST provides a Python API for easy integration with frameworks and a CLI for copying files from one site to another.
  • Real-Time Monitoring - FTS provides monitoring for several profiles: General monitoring (Grafana) for end users, Discovery Data (Kibana) for researches and Service Specific (ftsmon/Kibana) for service managers.
  • Optimizer - Taking the most from our infrastructure: The optimizer makes it possible to run transfers between any two random endpoints with good reliability and performance with zero configuration by default.
  • GFAL2 - Multiprotocol support: GFAL-2 is a plugin based library for file manipulation supporting multiple protocols (Webdav/https, GridFTP, xroot, SRM).
  • Support: FTS support is excellent thanks to the FTS team at CERN.