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Elastic HPC Extending the Cluster into the Cloud. Ruth Lynch, Research IT Service 13 th November 2009. HPC in UCD. Research IT Service 2005 HPC is Core Service Phaeton Cluster - Community & Shared Services 11% ICHEC Stokes Cluster 2008 . What's the problem?.
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Elastic HPC Extending the Cluster into the Cloud Ruth Lynch, Research IT Service 13th November 2009
HPC in UCD • Research IT Service 2005 • HPC is Core Service • Phaeton Cluster - Community & Shared Services • 11% ICHEC Stokes Cluster 2008
What's the problem? • Physical HPC Cluster is inelastic • Users sometimes need more resources than are available • Adding resources can be a slow process • Capital intensive process
Possible Solutions • "Pre-order" hardware • Buy compute time on other facilities • Investigate "The Cloud"
Which Cloud? • Cloud options • Locations • Different definitions • "a style of computing where massively scalable IT enabled capabilities are delivered 'as a service' to external customers using Internet technologies" - Gartner Inc.
Getting on the Cloud • Amazon Web Services • No technical issues • How to pay for the services? • Credit Card? • Prepaid credit card? • Prepay for Amazon credit? • Get billed by Amazon? • .......
“All Aboard” the Cloud • Contacted Amazon • Applied for a research grant with Amazon • Got a small grant • Started building...
Technical Specifications • Compute Nodes • Up to 20 x Large Instances • AMD Opteron 2218 HE • 4 vCPU Cores • 7GB of RAM • CentOS 5.2 • On Demand
Security • Users authenticate through Phaeton Login Node • LDAP Authentication • Encrypted Communications • 128 bit AES encryption for the data link • 160 bit SHA1 checksum for both the data and control channels
Management • Cloud Nodes are managed by Phaeton Head Node • MOAB from Adaptive Computing / Torque • Specific queue for cloud based resources
Data Concerns • Data Protection Laws • Data Transfer Rules • Intellectual Property Laws • Data Privacy
Data Concerns • Amazon gives choice of location • EU-WEST-1A & EU-WEST-1B • Data not "stored" in the cloud • Computation only in the cloud UCD Campus AWS
Computational Results • Real users with real jobs • Results dependent on job and user type
What else? • AMD vs INTEL • Licensing • Tuning • Cost comparison • Currently appears more expensive than local resources • Approx. €9,500 per month for AWS • Costs have recently fallen
The Benefits • Immediately available resources • "Once off" usage charge for resources • Relatively quick to set up • Easy to maintain • Viable option for occasional large scale single jobs
Future Plans • UCD “Cloud” • Incorporating existing local resources • Access to multiple public cloud resources • Seamless service provision • Automated “cloud bursting”
Thanks to ... • Amazon • Kurt Messersmith • Iain Galvin • UCD • Research IT Team • Research Community • Lukasz Szmit
Thank You • Ruth.Lynch@ucd.ie • http://www.ucd.ie/itservices/researchit/