University of Connecticut, Storrs

Apr 17, 2017

10:00 am - 12:00 pm

Instructors: Pariksheet Nanda

Helpers: Jingwen Pei, Xin Li, Tingyang Xu, Christian Kuntz, Luke Malinowski, Dave Christianson, Ed Swindelles

General Information

The HPC Essentials workshop is for any researcher to use UConn's computer cluster with no prior experience of the command-line or programming. We will cover what the cluster can do for you, how to navigate the command-line interface to run your programs and transfer data.

For more information on what we teach and why, please see our paper "Best Practices for Scientific Computing".

Who: The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don't need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop.

Where: Laurel Hall 306, Storrs, CT 06269. Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.

When: Apr 17, 2017. Add to your Google Calendar.

Requirements: Participants must bring a laptop with a Mac, Linux, or Windows operating system (not a tablet, Chromebook, etc.) that they have administrative privileges on. They should have a few specific software packages installed and an account on the HPC cluster (listed below). They are also required to abide by Software Carpentry's Code of Conduct.

Accessibility: We are committed to making this workshop accessible to everybody. The workshop organisers have checked that:

Materials will be provided in advance of the workshop and large-print handouts are available if needed by notifying the organizers in advance. If we can help making learning easier for you (e.g. sign-language interpreters, lactation facilities) please get in touch and we will attempt to provide them.

Contact: Please email hpc@uconn.edu for more information.


Schedule

Surveys

Please be sure to complete these surveys before and after the workshop.

Pre-workshop Survey

Post-workshop Survey

10:00 What is a modern supercomputer?
10:10 Using the UNIX shell
11:00 Loading modules and submitting jobs to the cluster
11:45 Saving results with Globus
12:00 Wrap-up

Syllabus

The Unix Shell

  • Files and directories
  • History and tab completion
  • Creating and running shell scripts
  • Reference...

Setup

To participate in the workshop, you will need access to the software described below. In addition, you will need an up-to-date web browser.

The Bash Shell

Bash is a commonly-used shell that gives you the power to do simple tasks more quickly.

Windows

You will need a terminal program to access the HPC cluster.

  1. Go to the Putty download page
  2. Click on putty.exe link under Alternative binary files to download putty
  3. To use it, double-click on the downloaded file

Mac OS X

The default shell in all versions of Mac OS X is Bash, so no need to install anything. You access Bash from the Terminal (found in /Applications/Utilities). You may want to keep Terminal in your dock for this workshop.

Linux

The default shell is usually Bash, but if your machine is set up differently you can run it by opening a terminal and typing bash. There is no need to install anything.

HPC cluster account

Please verify that you can connect to the HPC cluster via login.storrs.hpc.uconn.edu as described on our HPC wiki. If you have not connected to the cluster before, you will need to login with your NetID and request an account using this form: hpc.uconn.edu/storrs/account-application.

If you do not have a Net ID, please have a faculty member or other UConn employee setup an affiliate NetID for you: affiliate.uconn.edu. Approval for a NetID takes about 1-2 business days.