Table 1-1 Determining the Node Platform

Platform

Partial Output of /proc/cpuinfo

 

 

 

CP3000

processor

: 0

 

vendor_id: GenuineIntel

 

cpu family

: 15

 

model

: 3

 

model name: Intel(R) Xeon(TM)

 

 

 

CP4000

processor

: 0

 

vendor_id

: AuthenticAMD

 

cpu family

: 15

 

model

: 5

 

model name

: AMD Opteron(tm)

 

 

 

CP6000

processor

: 0

 

vendor

: GenuineIntel

 

arch: IA-64

 

family: Itanium 2

 

model

: 1

 

 

 

 

 

 

NoteThe /proc/cpuinfo file is dynamic.Node Specialization

The HP XC system is implemented as a sea-of-nodes. Each node in the system contains the same software image on its local disk. There are two types of nodes in the system — a head node and client nodes.

head node

The node that is installed with the HP XC system software first — it is used to generate

 

other HP XC (client) nodes. The head node is generally of interest only to the administrator

 

of the HP XC system.
client nodes

All the other the nodes that make up the system. They are replicated from the head node

 

and are usually given one or more specialized roles to perform various system functions,

 

such as logging into the system or running jobs.

The HP XC system allows for the specialization of client nodes to enable efficient and flexible distribution of the workload. Nodes can be assigned one or more specialized roles that determine how a particular node is used and what system services it provides. Of the many different roles that can be assigned to a client node, the following roles contain services that are of special interest to the general user:

login role

The role most visible to users is on nodes that have the login role. Nodes with the login

 

role are where you log in and interact with the system to perform various tasks. For

 

example, once logged in to a node with login role, you can execute commands, build

 

applications, or submit jobs to compute nodes for execution. There can be one or several

 

nodes with the login role in an HP XC system, depending upon cluster size and

 

requirements. Nodes with the login role are a part of the Linux Virtual Server ring, which

 

distributes login requests from users. A node with the login role is referred to as a login

 

node in this manual.
compute role

The compute role is assigned to nodes where jobs are to be distributed and run. Although

 

all nodes in the HP XC system are capable of carrying out computations, the nodes with

 

the compute role are the primary nodes used to run jobs. Nodes with the compute role

 

become a part of the resource pool used by LSF-HPC and SLURM, which manage and

 

distribute the job workload. Jobs that are submitted to compute nodes must be launched

 

from nodes with the login role. Nodes with the compute role are referred to as compute

 

nodes in this manual.
Storage and I/O

The HP XC system supports both shared (global) and private (local) disks and file systems. Shared file systems can be mounted on all the other nodes by means of Lustre or NFS. This gives users a single view of all the shared data on disks attached to the HP XC system.

20 Overview of the User Environment