October 19, 1995
Dear Principal Investigator:
As most of you know, we are in the process of installing and configuring
the first phase of our new supercomputing facility. This note is to apprise
you as to the state of this new facility and give you advance notice of
the procedures you will need to follow in order to obtain access to the
new resources for your research group.
The new computing facility is based on Silicon Graphics computers. The
first phase includes two new machines, named Tinker, an 18 processor Power
Challenge and Tonka, a 12 processor Power Onyx. The older machine, Ursa-major,
will be merged with these two machines to form a 38 processor, 3-way
Challenge Array cluster. This facility is intended to replace the CM-5 and
the CM-5 complex will be shutdown in mid-December.
The new SGI computers were installed during the summer and for approximately
the past six weeks we have been running a “Friendly User” period. During
this period early adopters of this new technology have been helping us
shake out the bugs. While not all of the problems have been completely resolved,
we feel that the system is quite usable and we are ready to begin migrating
additional projects from the Connection Machine to the new system.
In about ten days, you will receive email with instructions on how
to get computer logins on the new system for people in your research
project. As we have done in the past, we will create a password-protected Web
page for each of your projects. If you are not planning on moving your
research project to the new facility, you need do nothing. If you wish
to move to the new facility, you will need to review the information,
make any changes in the list of participants and click on a button to
send the information back to us. In either case you may continue to
use the CM-5 until it is shut down later this year.
One change from previous years is that we will be exclusively using the
Web for project renewals and will no longer take paper or email forms.
By converting all our account forms to the Web, we expect
to significantly reduce the time required to process account requests.
Those faculty who used the Web renewal process last time generally found
it quicker and easier to use than the other methods. However, in order
to use the Web forms you must have an account on Conx and know your
password. If you do not have an account on Conx, do not know the password,
or don’t know if you have an account, please get in touch with us at your
earliest possible convenience for further directions.
If you do not wish to have a computer account or to deal with the Web
forms, you have two options. First, you may make an appointment to
come to Information Technology and meet with a member of the SCV
staff who will review the information and submit the necessary forms
for you. Second, you may delegate your management responsibilities to a
project administrator. These responsibilities include adding or removing
researchers from your project, requesting resource allocations, and
reviewing computer usage reports. The designated project administrator
must be a University employee, not a student.
If you need more information on obtaining an account or designating
a project administrator, please contact us by email to
scfacct@bu.edu or call either Aaron Fuegi or Laura Giannitrapani at 353-2780.
Sincerely,
Glenn Bresnahan
(glenn@bu.edu)