Minutes of the ITC-Research Computing Standing Committee

(ITC-2015 Ivy Road, Room 102)

Meeting on September 27, 2004

 

Members:  Alice, Bill, Dawn, Ed, Hamp, Kathy G., Katherine H., Jim, Mark S., Martha, Michael, Robin, Sue Ellen, Steve, Terry, Tim S., Joe Simard, Tom S.

 

Attending: Alice, Bill, Ed, Hamp, Kathy G., Katherine H., Mark S., Keith Moores (for Robin), Steve, Terry, Tim S., Joe Simard, Tom S.

 

Chair:  Tim T.  Recorder:  Alice

Click here to see the agenda from this meeting.

 

I. Corrections to minutes from the last meeting onAugust 25, 2004?  None.

 

II.   Ongoing Discussion Topics:

1.  Cluster projects:

·    Teal cluster.  CrayLink has been ordered and is here.  Installation and reconfiguration are scheduled for 9/30/04 (i.e. put 2 processors removed from crick and put into one teal node; use CrayLink to hook them together – and link other 4 CPUs as well).  Reconfiguration (into a new batch processing cluster) will be completed in October (with PBSPro on them).

 

·    Aspen & Birch cluster upgrade to 2.6 kernel?  Timeline dependent on ROCKS upgrade.

–        No word on the ROCKS upgrade or the 2.6 kernel for Enterprise.

·    SUN netras and racking equipment for bigger, new orange cluster have not been ordered yet.

2.  Additional disk space for /longtmp and script to automate checking usage and reminding users.

·    Will be October or November (dependent on getting decommissioned some disk arrays from the Library). Hamp will check with Dennis Collins.

3.  Schedule for adding additional disk space to /common on jeeves for pending software installs (e.g., SAS, Maple)

·    Will add disk during this fiscal year – meanwhile can do the new version (9.5) of Maple.

4. Update on SEAS SUR grant clusters

·    About the same:  one cluster is ready for testing – Ed ran the standard scientific apps and Katherine tested PBS – Ed will test the compilers.  Second cluster is not ready for testing yet.

5.  Proposal for Linux Cluster support as a for-fee service

·    Need guidelines for how to handle support for researchers who don’t purchase cluster support but expect assistance and guidance from ITC for their cluster.

6.  Condo Cluster proposal – minimum participation is 4 nodes with a 3 year support/replacement cycle.

·    Announced in September Research newsletter – got two inquiries so far – need to complete order by December.

·    Group working on this meets again October 14.

 

III.   New Topics:

7.  Two research support requests got funded from ITC’s budget for 2004-05:

·    Adding disk array (3 terabytes) to each cluster (Aspen and Birch) – these will be ordered as quickly as possible, but it will take a few weeks to get all the pieces together – and may have to bid it.

·    The extended warrantees have been ordered.  This extends Aspen’s warranty to May 2005 and Birch’s warranty to December 2005.

8.  What is the policy about doing warranty exchanges of disks?  We need clarification on this but have no University guidelines yet.

 

Next meeting is scheduled for Monday, October 25, 9:45AM – 11:15AM (a change from the usual time).

October Meeting cancelled - Next meeting November 29, 2004 at 10:30AM

 

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