Hardware:Frontenac

The Frontenac cluster is CAC's newest compute cluster. It features a new set of hardware, a new network configuration, a new scheduler, a new software module system, a new OS, and a new set of compilers and related software. This page is intended to give an overview of its capabilities and provide a migration guide for new users. Please note that user accounts and data are *not* shared between Frontenac and the SW cluster, although you may request that your data is copied over.

Hardware

The Centre for Advanced Computing operates a cluster of X86 based multicore machines running Linux.This page explains essential features of this cluster and is meant as a basic guide for its usage.

Frontenac Cluster Nodes Host CPU model Speed Cores Core(s) per socket Sockets Features Memory cac025 E7-4800 v3 2.6 GHz 48 12 4 avx2, sse3 1 TB cac026 E7-4800 v3 2.6 GHz 48 12 4 avx2, sse3 1 TB cac028 E7-8867 v3 2.5 GHz 128 16 8 avx2, sse3 2 TB cac029 E7-8867 v3 2.5 GHz 128 16 8 avx2, sse3 2 TB cac030 E7-8867 v3 2.5 GHz 128 16 8 avx2, sse3 2 TB cac031 E7-8867 v4 2.3 GHz 144 18 8 avx2, sse3 1 TB cac032 E7-8867 v3 2.5 GHz 128 16 8 avx2, sse3 2 TB cac033 E7-8867 v3 2.5 GHz 128 16 8 avx2, sse3 2 TB cac034 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac035 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac036 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac037 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac038 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac039 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac040 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac041 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac042 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac043 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac044 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac045 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac046 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac047 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac048 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac049 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac050 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac051 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac052 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac053 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac054 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac055 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac056 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac057 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac058 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac059 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac060 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac061 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac062 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac063 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac064 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac065 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac066 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac067 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac068 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac069 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac070 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac071 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac072 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac073 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac074 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac075 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac076 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac077 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac078 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac079 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac080 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac081 E5-2650 v4 2.7 GHz 24 12 2 avx2, sse3 256 GB cac104 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 3xGP100 GPU 191 GB cac105 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 3xGP100 GPU 191 GB cac106 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 3xGP100 GPU 191 GB cac107 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 1xV100 GPU 191 GB cac108 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 1xV100 GPU 191 GB cac109 6130 2.1 GHz 32 16 2 avx2, sse3, 1xV100 GPU 191 GB cac111 EPYC 7551P 2.0 GHz 32 32 1 avx2, sse3, 1xTitan GPU 128 GB cac112 EPYC 7551P 2.0 GHz 32 32 1 avx2, sse3, 1xRTX4000 GPU 128 GB cac113 EPYC 7551P 2.0 GHz 32 32 1 avx2, sse3, 1xRTX4000 GPU 128 GB cac114 EPYC 7551P 2.0 GHz 32 32 1 avx2, sse3, 2xRTX4000 GPU 128 GB cac115 EPYC 7551P 2.0 GHz 32 32 1 avx2, sse3, 1xRTX4000 GPU 128 GB cac140 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB cac141 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB cac142 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB cac143 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB cac144 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB cac145 Epyc 7443 2.8 GHz 48 24 2 avx2, sse3, 2xA30 GPU 512 GB

Documentation

• Migrating off the Frontenac System
• Logging on to the system
• List of installed software and how to use it
• Storage and filesystems
• Submitting jobs using SLURM
• SLURM accounting and special job submission

Quickstart

For those who want to just log on and get started with the new system, the bare essentials are shown below.

Logging on

Login to the Frontenac cluster is via SSH access only. You will need an SSH client like Terminal on Linux/macOS or MobaXterm on Windows. To log on to the cluster, execute the following command in your SSH client of choice:

ssh -X yourUserName@login.cac.queensu.ca

The first time you log on, you will be prompted to accept this server's RSA key (d0:9f:e9:e2:b0:fe:6b:56:bb:74:46:c5:fb:89:a4:41). Type "yes" to proceed, then enter your password normally. No characters appear while typing your password.

Filesystems

The Frontenac cluster uses a shared GPFS filesystem for all file storage. User files are located under /global/home, shared project space under /global/project, and network scratch space under /global/scratch. In to network storage, each compute node has a 1.5TB local hard disk for fast access to local scratch space by jobs using the location specified by the $TMPDISK environment variable.

Submitting jobs

Frontenac uses the SLURM scheduler instead of Sun Grid Engine. The sbatch command is used to submit jobs, squeue can be used to check the status of jobs, and scancel can be used to kill a job. For users looking to get started with SLURM as fast as possible, a minimalist template job script is shown below:

#!/bin/bash
#SBATCH -c num_cpus                        # Number of CPUS requested. If omitted, the default is 1 CPU.
#SBATCH --mem=megabytes                    # Memory requested in megabytes. If omitted, the default is 1024 MB.
#SBATCH -t days-hours:minutes:seconds      # How long will your job run for? If omitted, the default is 3 hours.

# some demo commands to use as a test
echo 'starting test job...'
sleep 120
echo 'our job worked!'

Assuming our job is called test-job.sh, we can submit it with sbatch test-job.sh. Detailed documentation can be found on our SLURM documentation page. One final thing to note is that it is possible to submit an interactive job with srun --x11 --pty bash. This starts a personal bash shell on a node with resources available.

Accounts, Allocations, Partitions

Please check out our helpfile about allocations on the Frontenac Cluster

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