Hpc.kifu.hu

Workshoppal egybekötött User Forummal zárta az évet a HPC Kompetencia Központ

admin — Wed, 13 Dec 2023 12:13:04 +0000

The HPC Competence Centre closed the year with a User Forum and a workshop

Over the years, it has become a tradition that the HPC Competence Centre organises a User Forum every November, which this year joined the infra workshop series.

The aim of the event was to discuss the practicalities of getting the Komondor up and running and to facilitate the exchange of experiences between users.

The focus of the roundtable discussion was the developments needed for the safe use of Komondor, practice-oriented user training, as well as SME and large company cooperation and support opportunities.

admin Wed, 12/13/2023 - 12:45

2023

Felülmúlta a várakozásokat a Komondor iránt érdeklődők száma az idei Kutatók éjszakáján

admin — Thu, 12 Oct 2023 12:14:50 +0000

The number of people interested in Komondor at this year`s Researchers Night exceeded expectations

Nearly 200 people who were curious about the country's most powerful supercomputer, with a capacity of approximately 60 000 laptops, were able to attend a supercomputing lecture in Budapest and a supercomputer demonstration in Debrecen.

While the presentation in the capital was made really impressive by a mini "Raspberry HPC" - on which expert Zoltán Kiss illustrated the operation of Komondor -, there was no need for such a thing in Debrecen, as the participants could see the HPC up close, and the informative presentation quickly turned into a lively question-and-answer session between the experts and the audience.

The HPC Competence Centre in cooperation with the Budapest University of Technology and Economics and the University of Debrecen participated in the program series now organized for the 18th time.

For those who missed the opportunity this year, do not be disappointed, next year we are planning even more exciting presentations for the last Friday of September.

admin Fri, 10/13/2023 - 10:15

2023

A komondor, a világ egyik legzöldebb szuperszámítógépe

admin — Tue, 06 Jun 2023 12:53:14 +0000

Komondor, one of the greenest supercomputers in the world

In the recent TOP 500 list ranking the world's fastest supercomputers, Komondor, the supercomputer, takes the 229th place, and in the Green500 list published in June ranking the world's most energy-efficient supercomputers, it takes the prestigious 21st place. KİFÜ has imposed very strict energy efficiency criterion on Komondor, thus achieving an outstanding result at global level. The fully direct liquid-cooled HPC (High Performance Computing) infrastructure is capable of producing up to 40 times more cooling power than standard data centre racks. The waste heat produced will be used in the Sports Pool in Debrecen from the next heating season, reducing the cooling demand in a mutually beneficial way.

admin Tue, 06/06/2023 - 13:02

2023

HPC partnerek között az Eszterházy Károly Katolikus Egyetem

admin — Wed, 17 May 2023 12:28:56 +0000

HPC partners include Eszterházy Károly Catholic University

Eszterházy Károly Catholic University has signed a cooperation agreement with the Governmental Agency for IT Development (KIFÜ), so from now on one of Europe's fastest supercomputers, the Komondor, will also support their research.

On 10 May, the university held its first HPC workshop, which focused on the possibilities of using supercomputers and the experiences of previous partners. The event was attended by university students and researchers, market players of the region and IT professionals.

Photo: György Szántó

admin Wed, 05/17/2023 - 12:36

2023

Miniszteri látogatás a KIFÜ Szuperszámítógép Központjában

admin — Mon, 24 Apr 2023 09:29:59 +0000

Ministerial visit to the KIFÜ Supercomputer Centre

János Csák the Minister of Culture and Innovation visited Debrecen. After the Senate session of the University of Debrecen, the minister visited the Supercomputer Centre of the Governmental Information Technology Development Agency (KIFÜ). In the "home" of the Komondor supercomputer, which was handed over in January, Dr. Endre Spaller, the president of KIFÜ, greeted János Csák and then with Dr Attila Fekete, the leader of the HPC Competence Centre, presented the country's most powerful computer. The president of KIFÜ informed the minister that the supercomputer is no longer only used by higher education institutions, research centres, academic and governmental actors, but also by innovative SMEs. The use of the infrastructure is constantly expanding, and it is suitable for solving tasks, among others, in the fields of climate research, telecommunications, transport organization and energy. Endre Spaller highlighted that the Komondor is not only the most powerful supercomputer in Hungary, but in a unique way, the waste heat it produces will soon be used to heat the Sports Pool in Debrecen.

After visiting the Centre, János Csák looked around in the Déri Museum and then in the renovated building of the Csokonai Theatre.

admin Mon, 04/24/2023 - 11:42

2023

The Komondor`s performance has increased again

admin — Tue, 04 Apr 2023 13:02:40 +0000

The Komondor`s performance has increased again

The most powerful supercomputer of our country arrived in Hungary in autumn, was handed over in January this year, and has already been expanded with additional partitions.

The supercomputer named Komondor operated by the Governmental Agency for IT Development (KIFÜ), has received a new hardware infrastructure so it is able to process an even larger set of data faster than before.

The expansion carried out at the end of February was justified by preliminary surveys, in order to make use of the machine's capacity - with the end of the pilot mode – by as many academic, governmental and market users as possible. The goal is to provide the most modern IT infrastructure for partners active in research and innovation.

The exact details of the hardware upgrade can be found at https://ncc.dkf.hu/en/komondor.

admin Tue, 04/04/2023 - 13:02

2023

50 000 laptop teljesítménye, egyetlen szuperszámítógépben –megérkezett Komondor, hazánk legerősebb szuperszámítógépe

admin — Thu, 10 Nov 2022 12:06:08 +0000

The performance of 50,000 laptops in one supercomputer – Hungary’s most powerful supercomputer the Komondor has arrived.

With a performance of 5 petaflops, the newest and most powerful supercomputer of our country, Komondor, debuts in the ranking of the world's TOP 500 supercomputers. The system operated by the Governmental Information Technology Development Agency (KIFÜ) will soon be available to users after the tests.

Having enormous computing power, the supercomputer, i.e. the High-Performance Computing (HPC) infrastructure, is now indispensable in scientific life as well as in the development of innovative industrial solutions. On a daily basis, it helps in solving tasks such as climate research, telecommunications, transport organization, energetics, production optimization or the development of the latest achievements in medicine.

The installation of the latest Hungarian supercomputer, Komondor, began in September at KIFÜ’s Supercomputer Centre, in Kassai Street Campus of University of Debrecen. The performance of the new super machine can be 5 HPC petaflops which in addition to the high-capacity processor and graphic computing units also includes a dedicated Artificial Intelligence and Big Data partition. Equipped with energy-efficient cooling, Komondor will be available with a bandwidth of 100 Gb/s through the network provided by KIFÜ, which serves domestic higher education, public education, research and development, libraries, public collections and other public institutions. The machine's capacity can be used free of charge by higher education institutions, research institutes and their partners over and above under certain conditions, this option is also available to innovative market players carrying out research and development activities.

„"A 2020 government decision (1422/2020. (VII. 23) designated the KIFÜ as the organization responsible for the development and operation of the national HPC infrastructure, as well as the operation of the national competence centre. Since then, the KIFÜ HPC Competence Centre has been established. The task of the centre is to build the domestic HPC community and popularize the supercomputing technology, as well as maintain active contact with foreign professional partners. The goal of the centre is to help users learn about the potential inherent in supercomputing technology and to acquire specific knowledge. Our HPC project is a tremendous national IT development of the decade, thanks to that a supercomputer of which performance is the same as that of 50,000 laptops will begin to operate," said Dr. Endre Spaller, general deputy president of the Governmental Information Technology Development Agency.

More information at https://ncc.dkf.hu/en/komondor

admin Fri, 12/02/2022 - 07:59

Aktualitás

„Mi nem tudunk élni szuperszámítógépek nélkül” – interjú Nyári Bendegúz Tamás HPC-ösztöndíjas PhD hallgatóval

Teszt szerkesztő — Wed, 28 Sep 2022 14:23:35 +0000

"We cannot live without supercomputers" - interview with Bendegúz Tamás Nyári, HPC scholarship PhD student

How would you introduce yourself, what is your research area?

I am a doctoral student at the Department of Theoretical Physics at the BME Faculty of Science, and I will write my dissertation in the coming year. Within theoretical physics, I deal with the ab initio simulation of the electronic structure of solids. This is the collective name of methods with which, as the Latin name shows, it is possible to carry out simulations from the beginning, based on physical principles. Of course, the methods themselves are quite complicated and complex, but they give us the opportunity to perform material-specific simulations. In the framework of my application, I investigated the quantum states of magnetic atomic structures artificially formed on the surface of various superconducting-metal heterostructures.

What is the purpose of this research?

Investigating and understanding exciting physical phenomena that may be relevant to information technology and may one day form the basis of the tools of the future. On the basis of the above, it is even possible to formulate a proposal as to what could be the materials that can best be used for specific purposes. An example for this is the examination of the surface of the superconducting niobium, in the case of different cover layers and surface magnetic impurities, where our goal is to find combinations in which the formation of the so-called Majorana states is possible. Because if it were possible to find materials in which these Majorana states appear, then they would provide an opportunity to create a new quantum bit that works with a much smaller error.

How are these results used?

We conduct basic research, but later, of course, there will be industrial applications of these calculations, only in a larger context, in this case in the form of a quantum computer based on Majorana states. In the short term, however, the main joy and motivation is the understanding of the observed physical phenomena and the acquisition of the knowledge that can be obtained in this way.

When did you first encounter supercomputing?

I wrote my BSc thesis and MSc thesis in the same research group, where I am currently doing my doctorate. In the beginning, I did theoretical calculations on paper, which gave rise to my BSc thesis. After that, the obtained results had to be tested and implemented, and that's when I performed specific calculations for the first time, for which I used the department's small computer cluster. Then, for my master's degree, I already carried out an examination of a specific family of materials, which were more resource-intensive calculations and exceeded the capacity of a desktop computer.

Was HPC not part of your studies before?

Supercomputing was not a subject at the university. Here at the BME, it is certainly not taught, at least not in physics education, although in my opinion it would be necessary. Currently, the practice is that those who need it, learn it in a self-taught way, with the help of the Internet or their colleagues.

What is the role of HPC in your field?

My field of expertise, in the narrow sense, could hardly exist without a supercomputer. We have program codes that require much more resources compared to a PC, a typical calculation can use up to 100 processor cores. We cannot live without supercomputers, even if there were an alternative, it would require a completely different methodology.

Where did you find out about the Competence Centre’s scholarship application?

Our group already had a KIFÜ project, to be more precise, it is still running. I also made calculations in that, so I was already a user, and that's how I receive the KIFÜ newsletter. But it was also featured in the BME's internal newsletter.

What project did you apply for?

With an already running project. I had already had previous results, so everything was prepared, but the infrastructural possibilities were lacking. I had everything, I had what needed to be calculated, I had the program codes, all I needed was computer time. When I read the description, I immediately saw that it completely fitted my profile. I can briefly summarize that my application included calculations regarding the quantum bits that form the basis of the quantum computer, as well as the research necessary for various quantum bit implementations. I hope that my results will appear one day in different hardware as well.

Will you be able to reach your goal?

This is a difficult question because there are so many results. But it is common in research that as we move forward, more and more opportunities open up, new ideas come. All in all, I can say that I have achieved most of the goals I set in February, but seeing the results, I can continue in a lot of new directions.

Do you plan on continuing?

Yes, I definitely plan to take it further because there is so much more to be done. I can't really see this project as a complete work. For me, it is more of an ongoing thing, of which this application was a milestone, building on which it is possible to move forward in new, exciting directions.

What was it like to use the KIFÜ supercomputer?

My task was to transfer and configure the codes already working elsewhere, in this my mentor, Imre Szeberényi also helped a lot. With minor difficulties, but we managed to get everything working in a short time.

How challenging do you find using a supercomputer?

It can be learned quickly at the user level if you have the basics of programming and computer technology. The primary challenge is that nowadays everyone uses graphical interfaces, so if you get a terminal, it freezes, and it's hard to "do whatever with it". On the other hand, those who feel at home in the Linux terminal will quickly understand the operation of HPC and can get by quickly. All this can be learned on a desktop computer as well. Another novelty in an HPC environment is the use of the scheduler, you really only come across this on HPC, but I think there are excellent tutorials for this as well, where the basics can be learned in a few hours. Problems come when something might not work. When you have to go deeper into things, it can be a challenge. But if there is a well-functioning program code that is installed, it is quick and easy for the user to manage HPC.

What does it take to be an effective supercomputer user?

In higher education, the computer is relegated to the background, or at least the courses follow the development in the field of computer technology very slowly. Very little programming is taught, or was taught when I did my BSc. However, in order for one to be able to use a supercomputer effectively, efficient codes are needed first. Having said that, the user is already working with ready-made codes most of the time, so the most important thing is to know the program in hand and know how it works, how to make the best use of the available resources.

Who would you recommend the supercomputer to?

I think there are plenty of opportunities in engineering as well, we could open towards that. For example, the computational demand of flow simulations is enormous. The same applies to industry, car manufacturers and machine manufacturers must use their own supercomputers for simulations. The bottleneck in their case is software licenses. Many scientific fields have their own licensed program codes, without which they cannot exist, but at the same time, these licenses also have serious financial implications. We work with a program package developed in-house, which is quite diverse and we can deal with a lot of topics.

Does this diversity also apply to your research project?

Yes. On the one hand, we also develop, on the other hand, we see the direction in which science is going, and we follow it as well. My supervisor, László Szunyogh and his colleagues started researching this area in the early 1990s, almost 30 years ago. It was then that the program package used today began to be developed, and since then hundreds of technical articles have been created using these codes.

How do you see the future of supercomputing?

They hand over a lot of machines, this is a very seriously developing sector, which has been available to us for a relatively long time. More computing options, more processors, and larger memory result in larger systems and increase complexity. In general, it is clear that the world is moving towards big data, which is designed for these huge machines. Closely related to this is artificial intelligence, which can do amazing things with good algorithms from large data sets and is appearing in more and more fields. These applications trickle down to the level of ordinary people, appearing as exciting products and services in everyday life. For example, a self-driving car, or various personalized advertisements, or anything that is based on using artificial intelligence to predict our behaviour and decisions based on the data collected about us.

What do you think about the quantum computer?

We are conducting basic research in this direction, but the end product is a distant mystery to us as well. Calculations on different quantum mechanical systems can be much faster on a well-functioning and suitably sized quantum computer. However, this is still the future, at the moment only very few, and in reality, not very practical algorithms have been able to show with the current tools the superiority of the quantum. In order to obtain a tool that can also be applied to real physical problems, a lot of research is still needed. The biggest concern is that the encryption used in all digital communications will be cracked in seconds once it is created. The other problem is that classical computers and quantum computers often work almost as complements to each other, what is fast on one is slow on the other, and vice versa. Researchers are working intensively to invent encryption algorithms that are difficult to crack with both.

Can this be solved?

Probably yes. These are mathematical problem areas, mathematicians are used to investigating what is possible. I think it can be solved, otherwise the warning bells would be ringing and they wouldn't talk about the fact that research is going on in this field as well. Quantum informatics itself is a separate field of research, to find problems and develop algorithms that can be easily calculated and simulated on such hardware. However, the quantum computer is still far away, and we don't really know exactly what it will be good for and when. In fact, we are currently at the point where a lot of HPC simulations are needed to build a quantum computer. But this is still the distant future, we have now entered the era of HPC.

admin Mon, 11/07/2022 - 14:15

Aktualitás

„ …a szuperszámítógép a világ megismerésének új ablaka” – interjú Kapás Kornél HPC-ösztöndíjas PhD hallgatóval

HoppZo — Thu, 22 Sep 2022 06:48:27 +0000

“… supercomputer the new window to the cognition to the world” interview with Kornél Kapás, HPC scholarship PhD student

How would you introduce yourself, what is your research area?

I deal with theoretical particle physics. I already specialized in this field during my university studies. At first, I did experimental work during my undergraduate years, for example I worked on detector development, but during my master's I switched to the theoretical direction.

Why did you switch to the theoretical field?

When I dealt with the development of detectors, I was already very interested in programming and software development. This is actually necessary for all physical research. After BSc, I looked for a topic, worked here and there, then I found my current research group, where coding and parallel programming played a particularly large role. It is not a purely theoretical field in the sense that we create new models. I deal with the part of particle physics where there is an existing model, and from it we calculate things that were not possible before without the appropriate IT tools.

How did you encounter supercomputing?

My current supervisor, Sándor Katz, has a research group and a supercomputer. The first time I saw a live supercomputer was six years ago

Did HPC play a role in your studies before?

I had a course on parallel programming, but not at the HPC level. It was more about how to write programs for GPUs, but that was also only an optional subject in my major. I was introduced to supercomputing when I joined my research group.

Why did you get connected to supercomputers so "late"?

There are some branches of physics where HPC is definitely needed, but there are also some where it is not necessarily, although this is constantly changing. Where Monte Carlo simulations are used, as we are, it is needed. I have astrophysicist friends who, after their master's degree, got involved in a collaboration where they use HPC, and they only got to know the technology there. HPCs are also used intensively in other areas, such as network research or neural networks, but even there students typically only encounter it when they join a research group. I started 10 years ago, maybe the situation is different today.

How can HPC be used in your field?

We have particle physics models that need to be supported from both sides. The weight of the proton and neutron has been measured for some time, but it was not clear how to calculate, for example, the weight of the proton from the Standard Model of particle physics. We had the formulas, but before the supercomputers it was impossible to solve this task because the equations to be solved were extremely complicated. There is a formalism with which we can reduce the equations from the otherwise infinite-dimensional integral to a finite multidimensional integral. This is lattice theory. In short, this involves interpreting continuous space-time at discrete grid points, then gradually densifying them, and finally obtaining the result for continuous space-time. This is a technically difficult procedure, tens of millions of integrals have to be performed, which is impossible on a traditional computer, not to mention on paper. Monte Carlo simulations are needed for this, but they also need to be well optimized so that the calculations can be completed within a finite time. This is clearly impossible without a supercomputer.

Did the supercomputer make a new procedure possible?

The formalism I use burst into in 1974, so it's basically an old theory. However, truly efficient and exciting calculations only became possible in the early 2000s, with the appearance of more serious HPCs. The Standard Model of particle physics, which describes the behaviour of elementary particles, was born in the second half of the previous century. But there were only conjectures about what kind of properties a proton, neutron, or atomic nucleus would have if it was made up of these, it was impossible to calculate. In simpler models, it was of course possible to calculate this and that, but the real particle physics quantities not in all cases. In general, science works by creating a model, calculating things from it, and then testing it experimentally. My job is to examine certain parts of the Standard Model to see if it theoretically reproduces the quantities that we have already measured experimentally. If we validate a model in this way, then of course it must also be able to make predictions, which we can then verify experimentally.

What is the purpose of the model?

Put it simply; three quarks make up a proton or neutron, and these quarks always like to be in threes or twos. But at very high temperature or extremely high pressure, this can dissipate into a quark-gluon plasma. We know this from experiments that it happens. The temperature at which this happens, the order and speed of the phase transformation, can in principle be calculated from the Standard Model. This is a very complicated task, it was impossible to calculate it for real physics until 20 years ago.

Are you testing specific items using this method?

We have six kinds of quarks, or so we think. Of these, the three lightest typically occur the most often. The model I am investigating focuses on the behaviour of the substance containing these three quarks. The question is when and how quickly these hadrons, i.e. particles consisting of two or three quarks, transform into quark-gluon plasma. So I deal with the properties of such phase transitions of systems containing many particles.

Has the supercomputer opened up a new dimension in your field?

In any case, it made a big swing on it. Lattice field theory has been around since 1974, but very simple models were used. There were some ideas of what the results would be in real physics, but it was only when supercomputers appeared, especially graphics card clusters, that the weight and other properties of a real particle, such as the proton, could be calculated for the first time. This agreed with the experimental results, thus validating the Standard Model, and many publications were also produced. I have arrived into the more mature period of the method, but there are still quite a few exciting things that can be investigated.

What can we find out about the project included in your application?

I'll start a little further. When I started my PhD, I specifically had to calculate a certain physical quantity related to the phase diagram. This has been calculated before, but we have no results on a finer grid, especially in the continuum limit. However, in all kinds of Monte Carlo simulations, there are two errors, the sign problem and the overlap problem. If I increase the volume of the system, the severity of the problems also increases exponentially with this increasing the amount of errors. The sign problem can be easily measured, but the overlap problem may not be recognized immediately. It turned out that in specific cases these are so serious that they cannot be solved even by multiplying the statistics. We have already found a method previously, after which only the sign problem remained the only hindering factor, but it cannot be bypassed. Looking for a solution to this, last year we tried a method on a toy model, which, although it is not perfect, alleviates the sign problem. I investigated a far more complicated version of this game model within the framework of the project included in the application.

Have you managed to achieve your goals?

Yes. I managed to plan my project in such a way that I had planned exactly when and what I would do, what kind of result I would expect, and everything I expected actually came out. There were some results, which had come even sooner than expected, so I calculated one or two extra things. The results are very promising, so I hope to be able to publish in a newspaper with a high impact factor.

Has the KIFÜ supercomputer caused any surprises?

Yes. Our job management is different, few people use the machines, so we distribute access verbally, often per machine. This is a completely workable thing in a small group. Many more people can use the machines of the KIFÜ, so some kind of task manager is needed. I start, let's say, 300 jobs, and from then on everything happens automatically. I liked this very much, it is much more convenient and there is much less possibility of error.

_{Kvantum-színdinamika rácson}

How challenging do you find using a supercomputer?

It depends on the level you are on at the beginning, but those who enjoy it will learn quickly.

What is needed for an effective application?

Curiosity and determination. Just for fun, I sometimes go to NVIDIA's website and see what new architectures have come out, how they work, how to write a program according to a public tutorial, which will make the code the most efficient for the given card. Obviously, it helps a lot if it entertains us.

Who would you recommend the supercomputer to?

For anyone who deals with complex systems, where the algorithms can be parallelized very well. Monte Carlo simulations could usually be run on a single machine anyway, but it would take years. On several machines, the appropriate Monte Carlo statistics are collected sooner. As time goes on, more and more people will say they need HPC. Although they have been used in our area for 20 years, it will soon be the dominant one everywhere. What can be calculated on paper or on a computer have been calculated, the supercomputer is a new window for learning about the world. Just like the computer, the supercomputer will spread everywhere, we're going one level up.

How do you see the future of supercomputing?

Moore's law is well known, but now the strip width of the chips is about a few tens of atoms wide, we cannot really reduce the sizes any further. How fast a CPU is also starting to become saturated, because if we increase its performance, it gets so hot that it becomes impossible to cool it down. Reducing the size of the chips and increasing their capacity is therefore most likely not possible, so a supercomputer is the solution for drastically increasing capacities.

admin Mon, 11/07/2022 - 14:06

Aktualitás

„…meg lehet találni az utat, hogy egyre hatékonyabban használjuk a HPC-t.” – interjú Balogh Gábor Dániel HPC-ösztöndíjas PhD hallgatóval

HoppZo — Wed, 07 Sep 2022 06:28:51 +0000

“... you can find the way to using HPC with ever-growing efficiency.” – interview with Gábor Dániel Balogh, PhD student with HPC Grant.

How would you introduce yourself, and what is your field of research?

I am an engineering IT specialist, currently at the “Pázmány Péter” Catholic University, and a student of the “Roska Tamás” PhD School of Technical and Natural Sciences. During the past 6 years, I focused on parallelisation. My research team studies the way of efficiently implementing parallel algorithms to CPUs and GPUs, and to clusters and supercomputers. Primarily, we work on the implementation of general algorithms that help the work of researchers. We automatically paralellise our simulations so that researchers – be it physicists, biologists, mechanical engineers or whatever – needn’t have to invest a lot of their time to understand how their existing application could be adapted. That is, we develop a domain abstraction.

When and how did you encounter supercomputing?

During the first semester of the MSc program, Dr. István Reguly taught a course on parallel programming at the university, and that’s when I first heard of supercomputers. We saw a broad spectrum there, from CPU parallelisation to GPU parallelisation. I got attracted to it because it involves some challenges – you need to think slightly differently, and it also seemed a bit mysterious. Indeed, I approached him and said that I’d be happy to work on this more profoundly, which later became reality under the framework of an independent laboratory. Since then, I have been working on parallel programming in various fields under his supervision.

Didn’t your previous studies include HPC?

I studied molecular bionics during the BSc program, and parallel algorithms were marginally mentioned in relation to bioinformatics, but we never focused on supercomputers. The MSc program for engineering IT specialists already offers some courses on parallel programming towards the direction of HPC.

What is the role of HPC in your field?

In my field, we essentially focus on how to help others use HPC. For example, two years ago, a fellow in the same year at the university wanted to run spin simulations, and we helped this fellow accelerate the simulation code. Our framework is OP2 and OPS – the latter can be used to describe calculations on any structured network. That is, if we have a simulation that is operational on a square-grid, then you can adapt it to that. And our focus is on how to use it efficiently on both supercomputers and smaller clusters.

Is there an alternative to supercomputers in your professional field?

The question is how big the applications are, and whether you need a supercomputer. There are applications that make full use of an entire supercomputer; others are only paralellised to a portion thereof, even to a single GPU or a CPU node. But the entire research is conducted within the realm of HPC, that is, a supercomputer or a smaller cluster is needed.

Where did you hear about the call for grant applications of the Competence Centre?

If I remember correctly, it was my supervisor forwarding it to me in January, so I had ample time to prepare myself this application.

Why did you apply for this?

My primary motivation would have been to try out Komondor, which could enable us to run large-scale simulations as well. It is an exciting opportunity to get to know a new architecture, and thereby to join the support activities provided for Hungarian users.

With what project did you apply?

In the past, we had a research project for solving tridiagonal systems. This research was extended to pentadiagonal systems under the frameworks of a research grant. The goal was to create an algorithm with good performance in case of high node numbers, that is, something that can be de facto applied in supercomputers.

Will you manage to reach the specified goal?

The research project is ongoing, and we made considerable progress with it, but we still have issues we couldn’t fully resolve yet. But with the help of KIFU, we got some machine time for the supercomputer MARCONI, and the Italians welcomed us with open arms. There are architectural differences, and MARCONI has GPUs of the previous generation, so we are also curious to see the differences in performance.

_{A single és double precisionben végrehajtott szimulációk közötti eltérés egy szárnykeresztmetszet-menti áramlásszimuláció esetén}

To what extent do you think the use of supercomputers is challenging?

We always face challenges with supercomputers. When it’s about smaller applications, the challenge is to run the algorithms within the given node as efficiently as possible. As regards larger applications, interesting challenges include those related to the communication within the machine and to the organisation of the nodes. And our task is generalisation so that we will have good performance when solving the next similar problem.

What makes an efficient supercomputer user?

Primarily, it is motivation. You need to learn a lot, but you can find the way to using HPC with ever-growing efficiency. To start from a farther distance, with the use of a library that helps us understand parallelisation. From a closer look, by learning optimisation techniques, and this knowledge can be continuously extended.

Where does the professional level begin?

The more problems you know, the more new problems you can foresee. I have gathered experience with a lot of problems in the field of HPC, but still there is a huge number of things I would like to try out so that I can really understand how they work.

For whom would you recommend the use of supercomputers?

They can be useful in a great number of fields. Imaging and analysis are obvious examples for medical uses, and applications for the field of personalised medicine are also being developed. You may also gain a lot in more traditional areas of use, such as engineering design simulations, let’s say fluid mechanics. The scope of uses is extremely wide; what we primarily miss out on is to make potential users familiarise with supercomputers as soon as possible.

Do you think of higher education here?

For instance, yes. For example, people acquire a general knowledge of a machine learning environment relatively quickly. They teach their first one or two networks, and then try them out on GPUs too. This step, when you would run something so big which requires huge computing capacities, comes much later in other fields.

How long does it take to learn supercomputing at the basic level?

Not much on the basic level. We have a similar system in place on the university cluster, and you can quickly learn how to use it. Parallel programming and developing applications is more time-consuming. It is already a big challenge to ensure that a simulation could be efficient on an entire supercomputer since there exists a great number of methods and it depends on a lot of things. In case of computing on an entire supercomputer, communication is important because it’s essentially interconnected computers sending messages to each other. The higher the number of computers, the higher the cost of messaging. In order to manage this, one point that we focus on is to localize communication.

So you also need a support team to your supercomputer, right?

Ideally, it helps a lot, for example, to an astronomer. In the past, it was like this: everyone wanted to run simulations of ever-increasing complexity, and thus also learnt the necessary techniques. If you have a supportive team, then the steps of this extra learning could be reduced significantly, or may even be transformed into jumps.

Can you imagine the interaction between the various fields of science?

It is already working very well. There are frequent patterns that emerge during the calculations. These include, for example, the pentadiagonal equation solver, the subject of my present grant application. This type of equation set may also emerge in the case of financial calculations, as well as in fluid mechanics. If the building blocks of the algorithm are modular, they can be adapted to other fields of science.

How do you see the future of supercomputers?

Now that supercomputing finally entered the exascale range, the most exciting question is how to efficiently leverage such a huge computing performance. Growth is also an interesting topic – whether we will be able to keep up this speed of development. I very much welcome the tendency that the objective is also the same here in Europe: to ensure that the resources are used by an as wide range of users as possible.

What do you think of quantum computers?

admin Mon, 11/07/2022 - 12:18

Aktualitás