Bi-weekly Campus Grids and User Support Meeting

US/Central
Attending:
Emelie - UNL
Marko - FNAL
Suchandra, Lincoln, Rob - UC


Marko updates on CVMFS repo:
Issue: Is it better to use external repo or OASIS?
Spoke with Brian Bockelman and took a look at slides suggested by Rob last week: https://indico.fnal.gov/getFile.py/access?sessionId=1&resId=0&materialId=1&confId=8100
Conclusion: If mostly OSG staff installing software, then using osg-vo on OASIS should be fine.  If users are installing software, then an OSG repo off of osgconnect might be better.  Reasoning: it is awkward to have to log in somewhere else to update software.

Lincoln: Discussed OASIS external repository with Brian.  Would delegate rights to install software.  Published via OASIS and signed with OASIS key.  Will send around a link to the documentation:
 https://twiki.grid.iu.edu/bin/view/Documentation/Release3/OasisExternalRepositories.

Rob: Likes this approach very much (similar to uploading software to a cloud service).  There may be a delay before software is propagated to all the sites (we will have to look into this).  It is a good idea to partition off what is staff software.  External repository for users' code would be good to isolate any problems that come up.  Also, users don't want to wait for an OSG software librarian to update their code.

Suchandra Modules update: slides
Modules software: Lmod (supports TCL and Lua)
Installed Lmod and lua.  Set up python modules some python packages. Working with KnowledgeLab to test out modules in their workflow. Went over some basic modules commands/usage.  Next steps are to test modules on sites, and add more modules: Octave, NAMD, etc (come up with initial curation list).  Also include setup in OSG Connect wrapper script and create osgconnect-specific documentation.

Discussion of where to put setup script.  Would be nice to have it already set up for users when they land at a site. In this case we would have to talk to Mats about adding it to the OSG flock glidein.

Emelie update on NAMD:
Installed in OASIS, but test jobs not running.  Possibly no resources that match all requirements (OASIS + partitionable slots).  Will try a single-core version since not many sites are currently allowing whole-node jobs anyway (just Tusker and Crane at HCC?)

Lincoln update on Nix:
NIX is a package management tool that has some more specialized features than Modules.  Can be use together with Modules (they are independent).  NIX would require learning a whole new package management system and language, and if Modules is working well for us (out of the box, established), might not be worth it...

Rob: We should push ahead with Modules.  And it would be nice to have a documentation page that describes osg as a virtual cluster (similar to the support page that Mats wrote for xsede).  Documentation should just be the very basics of what is needed to run a job and where to get more information on various aspects (don't know where it would live yet.  Front page of osgconnect?)
Emelie suggest videos?

Rob: We should put the meetings into indico (Fermilab). https://indico.fnal.gov
Page with meeting coordinates, agenda, slides for updates, etc.  "Joint Campus Grids User Support Meeting".
Marko: Can find out who to contact for permissions on indico and tell Emelie.

 


Next meeting will be in 2 weeks using Marko's Readytalk:
July 1st, 2:00 p.m. (central)
dial in #: 866-740-1260
access code: 6643420


For next time:
Emelie: Continue with NAMD and get meeting up on indico.
Suchandra: Continue work with Modules.
Lincoln: Build out modules with what Suchandra has set up - R and possibly Blender.
Rob: May have an update next week on new support forum for osgconnect that is being set up (like a support service built directly into the portal itself.)  Evaluate that and see if it adds value.


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    • 1
      Environment Modules on OASIS
      Speaker: Mr Suchandra Thapa (Computation Institute / University of Chicago)
      document
      Slides