Tensor Cluster Usage Notes
Last update: 13Sep2006
Acceptable Use Policies
All users must abide by the
Acceptable Use Policies when using the
Tensor Cluster.
Accessing the Cluster
The cluster is accessible to authorized users via the SSH protocol.
Login and file transfer information
Storage
Disk storage is available under /home and /data and is accessible from every
cluster node. A small /tmp space is available on each node for transient
use only.
Storage information
Compilers
The Tensor cluster supports both the free GNU compilers as well as the
commercial compilers from the
Portland Group (PGI).
Compiler information
Libraries
Local usage notes are available for the following packages:
MPI for Parallel Applications
LAM-MPI is used as the message passing library
for parallel applications. We have built LAM using the PGI compilers.
All MPI processing will take place on the
cluster nodes in batch mode via TORQUE (aka OpenPBS).
No applications should be launched directly from the login node.
Please see the
LAM usage page -
(includes InfiniBand information)
Open MPI is the successor to LAM-MPI and consists of
components from LAM as well as other MPI implementations. We have compiled
Open MPI in 64-bit mode using the Intel compilers and have made it available
for testing. Please see our Open MPI page for
usage information. Upon completion of a successful testing period we will
replace LAM with Open MPI as our default MPI environment.
MPICH is another well known implementation of MPI.
However, due to issues handling processes that exit abnormally, we are
discouraging its use on the Tensor cluster. Documentation is
found on our MPICH page. Users wanting to use
MPICH should contact the System
Administrators prior to running their application compiled against
the MPICH libraries.
Batch Processing
We are using the TORQUE Resource Manager (based on OpenPBS)
for batch scheduling. All processing on the cluster must run through
the batch system. Do not run large memory or long running applications
on the cluster's login node. They will be terminated without notice and
your account will be closed if the abuse of the login node continues.
Local Batch Information
Contact
Please direct all questions to Steve Johnson, admin //A-T// tensor.tamu.edu.
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