Like many of you, I attended SC11 in Seattle this year. I have to say, the world’s largest HPC convention has become downright addictive—especially if you happen to be an ex-gamer. I had to extract myself from the “Gaming through the Decades” exhibition before I could even get started with more serious pursuits. Fortunately my willpower was well rewarded. In case you weren’t there, the focus was on big data and visualization, and the strides being made are truly amazing.

The advances made by the Intel Cluster Ready partner community are also very impressive. We held our third annual Partner Appreciation Award ceremony at SC11, and it was gratifying to see the progress we’ve all made in just the past year. The Intel Cluster Ready architecture is now represented across an enormous range of HPC solutions, from SMB clusters to some of the world’s Top500 supercomputers. Hardware and software support has also grown substantially, as has market penetration. For a look at a few of the most impressive developments, check out the award-winning partners below, and follow the links for more information. I think you’ll be intrigued.

We gave awards in three categories:

• The Pathfinder Award honors the vendor who has done the most to forge new paths into a previously unexplored area.
• Explorer Awards distinguish those who have continued to explore and implement programs that significantly advance the portfolio of solutions based on the Intel Cluster Ready architecture.
• Voyager Awards are for those who have contributed to expanding the global reach and overall market growth of Intel Cluster Ready solutions.

Here’s the list of the 2011 award winners. Enjoy!

Pathfinder Award

• Altair continues to drive innovation by making HPC cluster computing simpler and more productive for its customers. Over the past year, Altair integrated Intel Cluster Checker into PBS Professional, its HPC workload management and job scheduling solution, and registered three key applications for design and analysis: RADIOSS, AcuSolve, and OptiStruct.

Explorer Awards

• science+computing took Intel Cluster Ready into the upper reaches of HPC, installing a 292 TFLOP, 1700 node supercomputer at RWTH Aachen University. It’s the largest Intel Cluster Ready certified system to date, and one of the 30 largest supercomputers in the world. A joint success story will be coming soon to highlight the design win and promote Intel Cluster Ready.
• NEC delivered a huge Intel Cluster Ready win, with a certified 500-node cluster for the University of Erlangen. NEC then helped drive visibility and credibility for Intel Cluster Ready solutions with a success story and Web promotions.
• E4 Computer Engineering launched its E-Cluster 7225 platform, certified Intel Cluster Ready, which scales from four to hundreds of nodes! E4 has also integrated Intel Cluster Ready throughout its marketing communications and updated its website based on each new sales quote.

• Fujitsu has demonstrated a strong commitment to Intel Cluster Ready, integrating support throughout its PRIMERGY server product lines, and have achieved the greatest number of certifications in 2011 for certified Intel Cluster Ready clusters shipped in Europe. Starting at Fujitsu Technology Solutions it became a well-integrated part of the technical production workflow—beginning to end. Intel Cluster Ready is now an integral part of the Fujitsu standard cluster software stack for Intel architecture, and allows them to address a multi-geo market with HPC systems that are 'ready to go'.

• Bright Computing has played an integral role in enabling the Intel Cluster Ready ecosystem by fully incorporating support into its workflows and products, including integration of Intel Cluster Checker into Bright Cluster Manager 5.2. The company was instrumental in helping ensure that the complete HPC solution chain will be ready to support the Intel Xeon Processor E5 family at launch.

• The HPC Advisory Council made broad contributions to Intel Cluster Ready by testing, benchmarking and documenting implementation best practices for open-source applications, co-authoring and publishing a technical brief, and partnering in workshops to extend the awareness and value of Intel Cluster Ready solutions to new audiences.

Voyager Awards

• Flow Science created a cluster solutions guide for Silicon Mechanics and other OEMs to simplify the deployment of Flow-3D, a leading computational fluid dynamics (CFD) solution, on Intel Cluster Ready certified systems. Through this and related efforts, Flow Science is helping to bring HPC—and Intel Cluster Ready—into the digital manufacturing market.
• Silicon Mechanics has integrated Intel Cluster Ready into its technical workflows and sales processes to simplify and accelerate cluster implementation. The company also played a pivotal role in supporting the launch of Sandy Bridge EP and partnered with SIMULIA and Flow Science to deliver optimized, turnkey solutions based on the Intel Cluster Ready architecture.
• SIASA (Soluciones Informaticas Argentinas S.A.) was the first Intel Cluster Ready member in Latin America and has delivered more certified clusters than any other vendor in the region. As one example, SIASA helped the University of Cordoba implement the largest cluster in Argentina.
• Platform Computing is a leading Intel Cluster Ready partner and made a major contribution this year by launching Platform Cluster Manager 3.0, which makes it easier for non-technical customers to build, deploy, and manage Intel Cluster Ready certified systems. The company also provided valuable development support for upcoming Intel server platforms.
• ClusterVision – their commitment to Intel Cluster Ready is so strong that they have edited all their marketing materials and website to promote Intel Cluster Ready. They also implemented Intel Cluster Ready training into their annual sales meeting and launched a sales incentive program. The strategy has delivered new cluster solutions, including a cluster deployment for Ceres Power that was documented in a success story.
• Atipa has shipped eight "Rapid Launch" Linux Clusters in the last two years, all Intel Cluster Ready certified. Atipa has played a valuable role in enabling the HPC ecosystem for the launch of Sandy Bridge EP.
• Eurotech launched its Intel Cluster Ready certified Aurora product line. Then, after collaborating with AuroraScience on a dense, green cluster that’s certified Intel Cluster Ready, Eurotech helped produce a success story about the unique 10 Teraflop Aurora cluster that serves a variety of Italian research organizations and provides a basis for scaling to petaflops of performance.
• Univa has been a long-time supporter of Intel Cluster Ready and recently launched its UniCloud middleware, which makes it easy to deploy Intel Cluster Ready certified HPC clusters in private, hybrid, and public clouds (including RightScale and Amazon EC2).

That’s it for this year’s winners. I’d like to add my personal thanks to all of them.

Stay tuned for more information. I’ll be focusing in on some of these technologies and solutions in more detail in future blogs.

Intel Cluster Checker can run a variety of tests depending on what the user is trying to accomplish. For general wellness of a cluster, Intel Cluster Checker offers five levels of thoroughness. For automation, we'll focus on levels one, three, and five.

Wellness Level One is a very short run of tests that check basic connectivity throughout the cluster as well as basic uniformity checks amongst the nodes.  This test focuses on BIOS settings, and processor, memory and system configurations. The level one tests are quick and show that the cluster is online and ready for use.

Wellness Level Three is the default run level for Intel Cluster Checker. It builds on level one and includes more rigorous modules that test parameters like disk and memory bandwidth, MFLOPS, and network performance. It also performs an in-depth hardware uniformity test along with an Intel MPI Collectives and message Integrity test. It takes a bit longer to run this check that assures the performance of the hardware is up to par.

Wellness Level Five adds a packages test, comparing currently installed packages with a generated list of expected packages at a given time. It also runs the HPCC module (a performance benchmark test). The level five tests can take a bit longer but assures the users that all the pieces of the system are working in harmony. This test is useful for the admin to make sure a user hasn’t installed or uninstalled anything that may affect the cluster.

For my clusters, I have set up the following schedule that runs these wellness levels at various times.

• Level One - set to run each weekday
• Level Three - set to run once a week, on Saturday
• Level Five - set to run monthly, on the first Sunday

For our lab with multiple smaller clusters this automation schedule is perfect, allowing users to login to one of the clusters, see when each of the wellness levels passed and know that their jobs will run as expected.

Every cluster has a different purpose and a different load. Running tests at the intervals or frequency I have set may not be feasible or needed for every cluster. However, automating the test runs on a schedule that meets your needs will help assure that your cluster performance remains optimal, and frees up the cluster(s) for jobs during normal business hours.

References:

>> Review Part 1

>> About Intel Cluster Checker

>> Intel Cluster Checker Knowledge Base

Whether you're a cluster user that expects optimal performance and functionality every time you run a job, or a system administrator that needs to keep the cluster in perfect working order for your users, running checks on a regular basis is important!

A great way to ensure that your HPC system, certified Intel Cluster Ready, remains in the same great shape as when it was first built, is to run the Intel® Cluster Checker tool regularly.

While it’s easy enough to run Intel Cluster Checker on your cluster(s) once a week, I've found there are times when I was too busy, or simply forgot to run a check. For this reason, and because I have multiple clusters to check, I developed a method to automate Intel Cluster Checker runs. This automated solution runs Intel Cluster Checker and reports any errors directly to me and/or the system administrator. Not only does automating this process save the administrator a substantial amount of time each week, it will eliminate the chance of missing a run, and ensures that the cluster remains in optimal health.

A Cluster That Checks Itself

In order to automate the process, it is important that your Intel Cluster Checker passes a manual run first. To do this, make sure the configuration file is optimized to ensure the cluster is operating at its best. With the perfect configuration on hand, a script is then needed to setup the system, run Intel Cluster Checker, and report the results.

For the first phase of the process, I wrote a script that sets up the environment and runs the most in-depth wellness check in Intel Cluster Checker. I used cron to schedule my script to execute once a week. After the results are complete, the script updates the message of the day to show when the last check ran and the results. If the check fails, the log file created by Intel Cluster Checker will be copied to the specified directory where it can be accessed and analyzed.

The cluster is now setup to check itself, in the middle of the night, and report its status upon login!

Read Part 2 for more about scheduling test runs, and the different levels of wellness tests in Intel Cluster Checker.

References:

>> About Intel Cluster Checker

>> Intel Cluster Checker Knowledge Base

Your hardware vendor may be able to provide the information you need to install and run open source HPC applications. Another great resource is the HPC Advisory Council. The Advisory Council provides best practice recommendations and installation guides for a variety of HPC applications, as well as training opportunities, an online forum for interacting with HPC experts, and cluster resources you can use for testing, optimizing, and benchmarking your applications.

Intel has been working with the HPC Advisory Council to develop best practice recommendations and installation guides for popular open source HPC applications running on Intel Cluster Ready certified systems. Installation guides are available now for Adaptive Mesh Refinement, BQCD, CP2K, CPMD, Espresso, Himeno, LAMMPS, NAMD, NWChem, OpenFOAM, and WRF. If you don’t see the application you’re interested in, stay tuned. More are coming. Or contact the HPC Advisory Council. They’re always looking for input from HPC users.

Update - these installation guides are now available: Amber 11, CESM, GADGET-2, GROMACS, MrBayes, NEMO, Octopus, and OpenMX.

>> View all Intel Cluster Ready Installation Best Practices

For more about the HPC Advisory Council, go to hpcadvisorycouncil.com

For more Intel Cluster Ready information, visit intel.com/go/cluster

Read the HPC Advisory Council and Intel Cluster Ready Technology Brief

Seamless Transitions...

I'd add that the Intel Cluster Ready architecture applies in the cloud as well.  In fact, using cloud images based on Intel Cluster Ready architecture allows more seamless transitions between clusters running in the cloud to physical clusters running locally.  As the video points out, cloud provides an entry point into using HPC or even a try-before-buy approach to HPC clusters.  Cloud bursting benefits as well, since the application that runs on the architecture locally would see the same architecture in the cloud.

The common architecture enables the applications to better understand and execute on top of the computing environment without being tied to the exact details of the solution.  In other words, you can get better mileage with a common architecture in both the cloud and local clusters.

The results are then recombined to deliver whatever information design team is looking for, whether it's how the latest chassis protects the driver in a 60 MPH collision, or how a potato chip holds up between factory and bowl.

Intel® Cluster Ready provides an optimized platform for parallel computing, and helps to ensure that registered applications run seamlessly on certified systems. But that's only half the battle. Unless applications make efficient use of all that parallel computing capacity, they aren't going to deliver the kind of value that justifies the cost of a high performance cluster.

In other words, if you build a great cluster they will come, but only if you - or someone else - also builds great, compatible applications. Of course, writing good, parallel software code isn’t easy. It's tough enough writing applications that can efficiently use 12 processor cores in a high-end workstation. Writing code that can fully utilize 120 cores in a 10-node cluster, or 480 cores in a 40-node cluster, takes another level of expertise.

Optimized development tools can help - a lot. I encourage you to take a quick look at this video interview from SC10, or forward it on to one of your software-developing colleagues. Doctor Clay Breshears and Werner Krotz-Vogel, talk about Intel Cluster Studio 2011, a comprehensive bundle of tools for software developers who want to write highly optimized applications for Intel processor-based clusters (compilers, libraries, analyzers, and a lot more). Especially noteworthy in this package is a variety of new threading mechanisms for task, data, and vector parallelism. Clay and Werner provide an overview and discuss some of the features. They also give a shout out to Intel Cluster Ready and the more than 150 vendors who are delivering compatible systems and applications.

Enjoy the video!

Check out the Intel® Cluster Studio 2011 - a tool suite for MPI developers on HPC clusters.

Learn more about Intel® Cluster Ready

SC10 was fascinating…of course. The world's largest supercomputing convention is always a great barometer of the HPC industry. It gives you a look at what's happening now, and where the industry is going (in case you weren't there, the words "cloud" and "exascale" were in wide use.) This year, SC also provided a great barometer of the progress of the Intel Cluster Ready architecture and the ecosystem building around it. That’s because it was the venue for our second annual Partner Appreciation Awards ceremony.

One thing I found particularly gratifying about the presentations this year is that several of the key awards centered around real-world solutions that are having an impact in the marketplace. The awards also highlighted the behind-the-scenes contributions of some HPC vendors that are breaking new ground in the small-to-mid-range HPC market.  These guys are doing some very cool things and they don’t always get the recognition they deserve. Take a look at the award-winning vendors below, and click on the links if you want to know more. I think you’ll be intrigued by the scope and value of their offerings.

Just for the record, we gave awards in three different categories:

• Pioneer Awards, honoring early adopters and promoters of Intel Cluster Ready.
• Pathfinder Awards, to distinguish those who are working with Intel Cluster Ready to forge new paths into previously unexplored markets.
• Explorer Awards, for those who have continued to explore and implement new programs to advance solutions based on the Intel Cluster Ready architecture.

Here’s the list of the 2010 award winners. Enjoy!

Solution 1 - The Seismic Coverage Validation Engine from Landmark is a preconfigured supercomputing solution for oil exploration that is expanding the use of HPC methods into smaller shops. And the award winners are:

• Landmark (Pioneer) delivers the complete appliance, the Seismic Coverage Validation Engine
• Appro (Pathfinder) furnishes the hardware (32 nodes and up) with its Ready-To-Go Clusters

Solution 2 - A number of vendors helped Simpson Strong-Tie deploy a new cluster in just two days, enabling the company’s engineers to run more complex models and get results two to three times faster, while halving the data center footprint and reducing total costs. (Read the case study.)

• SIMULIA (Explorer) provided the simulation software (Abaqus/Explicit) and the pre-sales benchmark testing that closed the deal.
• Silicon Mechanics (Explorer) furnished the hardware with its Hyperform HPCi for Intel Cluster Ready.
• Platform Computing (Pathfinder) has also optimized its PCM middleware for the Intel Cluster Ready architecture, providing a simple cluster management environment for non-expert HPC users.

Solution 3 - Two vendors were particularly instrumental in helping the University of Plymouth deploy a cluster to support ground-breaking research into renewable energy through wave farming.

• Viglen (Explorer) delivered the hardware optimized for out-of-the-box simulations.
• Concurrent Thinking (Pathfinder) provided SmartCluster, designed for complete cluster software provisioning with one-click Intel Cluster Ready validation.

Driving the Market Forward (other behind-the-scenes contributors)

• ANSYS (Pathfinder) is accelerating the adoption of HPC in smaller design shops, by proving the value of its simulation solutions running on Intel Cluster Ready certified clusters through in-house benchmarking.
• Clustercorp (Pathfinder) has optimized its ROCKS+ middleware for the Intel Cluster Ready architecture. ROCKS+ now enables exceptionally simple provisioning and build of certified clusters.
• Mellanox Technologies (Pioneer) and the HPC Advisory Council, which was founded by Mellanox, are delivering a range of compliant fabric solutions, along with installation guides for open source applications on Intel Cluster Ready clusters.
• QLogic (Pathfinder) provides fabric solutions optimized for the Intel Cluster Ready architecture, and has been instrumental in early testing and benchmarking of Intel MPI 4.0 on its InfiniBand hardware.

Honorable Mention
A lot of additional vendors are focused on the Intel Cluster Ready architecture, and are delivering significant new technologies and products. A handful of them received honorable mention awards, including:

• Bright Computing: Bright Cluster Manager for the Intel Cluster Ready architecture
• ClusterVision: Responsible for an array of Intel Cluster Ready cluster deployments
• Fujitsu Technology Solutions: Now providing a range of certified cluster products.
• ICON: Driving new market penetration by promoting Intel Cluster Ready for digital simulation.
• Panasas: High-performance parallel storage solutions
• SGI: A family of Intel Cluster Ready certified solutions, including its innovative Octane III desk-side cluster.
• Transtec: Responsible for a significant number of critical, real-world implementations.

That's it for this year's winners. I'd like to add my personal thanks to all of them. Stay tuned for more information. I’ll be focusing in on some of these technologies and solutions in more detail in future blogs.

>> Learn more about Intel Cluster Ready HPC solutions

While manning the Intel Cluster Ready demonstration pod, I was able to listen in on Drew and Kirk talk about how real-time simulations are helping protect football players from serious injury.  They showed how helmets outfitted with sensors are being used to study and relay data about individual impacts to the head of players.  Simulations for those impacts can predict when dangerous levels of force have occurred and players are likely to have suffered a concussion.

This data can be used to help design better equipment, but more importantly may help prevent serious, long-term injury.  Players who have experienced a concussion may not feel the immediate effects or may not want to leave the game.  Additional impacts, however, can cause much more severe injury.  The simulation data can help identify when players need to be pulled out of a game for medical evaluation and/or to avoid serious injury.

It was a really cool demonstration to see - they even cracked two helmets together to show a live simulation of impact. One of many neat examples of high performance computing in action that I got to see at the show.

>> See related stories

Desktop Engineering: Intel to Safeguard Brains

Intel Newsroom: Intel Teams Up with Leading Researchers to Make Football Helmets Safer

Were you there? Please leave your comments about SC10.

Check back for more news and a follow-up from SC10.

Let Intel Cluster Ready be your guide…

Take the Intel Innovation Tour, learn about some of the Intel Cluster Ready partners, and enter to win a HP Pavilion Mini Netbook. Several tours each day, and a daily drawing at 5:00pm Wed. Check at Intel booth #2813 for times and details.

In-Booth Presentations & Demos at Intel Booth #2813
Come by to see the demos, hear about the latest Intel technologies, and catch up with the Intel Cluster Ready team and partners.

Presentation:

• Wednesday, Nov. 17, 10:00 am – Intel's Bill Magro will present Everything Works! End User Experience with Intel Cluster Ready. Come hear about end users like Simpson Strong-Tie and others who are reaping the value of an Intel Cluster Ready cluster.

Demos:

• 7 Reasons Why You Need Intel Cluster Ready, by Aspen Systems, Inc., Professional HPC Clusters and Services
• Appro Ready-To-Go Cluster Demo: Ready-To-Go Clusters for Seismic Coverage Validation Engine, part of Halliburton, Landmark ProMAX® software suite - Maximize geophysical investments with Appro Ready-To-Go Cluster, a pre-configured Intel® Cluster Ready certified supercomputing solution. Pre-tested to run Landmark's new Seismic Coverage Validation software tools, this solution makes the process of choosing the right system easy.

More Fun Events to Come at SC10!

HPC Idol 2010 – Giving up those HPC blues. Have time for a party on Wednesday evening? Don't miss the Platform Computing party at the House of Blues, from 6:30 – 10:00pm, Nov 17th.

Possibly, one of the highlights of this event will be an original, never before and likely never again, song from Intel Cluster Ready.... "Get Ready" with back-up vocals by the "Clusterettes."

How do you get your invitation to attend? Just stop by the Platform Computing booth #2739, Intel booth #2813, or QLogic booth #3649 to ask for an invitation to attend!

Partner Presentations

In the Appro Booth #1939:
Wednesday Nov 17th -

• 11:15am – Intel Cluster Ready and Appro Ready-To-Go Clusters, Rick Layden, Intel

• 11:45pm – Ready-To-Go Clusters with ANSYS, Barbara Hutchings, ANSYS

In the QLogic Booth #3649:
Wednesday Nov 17th -

• 1:30 pm – It's all about InfiniBand Clusters, presented by Jeremy Siadal of Intel.

Don't forget to look for us, your Intel Cluster Ready team, in booths 2813 and 4517.

Hope to see you here in New Orleans!

View webinar » Boost ANSYS Performance with HPC Clusters

On October 28th, ANSYS will host a joint webinar with Appro and Intel that highlights using ANSYS Mechanical HPC on clusters and dives into details of how the three companies are working to address issues to make clustering simpler.

I'll be participating in the talk and providing examples of what Intel Cluster Ready architecture means to the ANSYS application and the Appro solution.  Together, we'll focus on points that relate directly to our efforts to simplify purchasing, deployment, management, and use of cluster solutions.

This Virtual Seminar will be interactive.  We want to hear what your pain points are related to clusters, too! 

Please join us and take part in the discussion. Choose the AM or PM session that works best for you. Click on the headline below to access the registration links.

Webinar: Boost ANSYS Performance with HPC Clusters

Thursday, October 28, 2010
9:00 A.M. EDT, 1:00 P.M. GMT

Thursday, October 28, 2010
1:00 P.M. EDT, 5:00 P.M. GMT

Duration: 90 minutes

Join us for a Virtual Seminar to learn:

• How to simulate, analyze, and visualize models faster by deploying ANSYS HPC
• How the ANSYS and Intel Cluster Ready partnership simplify purchasing and speed deployment, helping to make cluster management affordable and easy
• How Intel Cluster Ready can help you to deploy, troubleshoot and optimize an ANSYS HPC cluster

All so you can get your job done faster.

Register now!