PCA 02: High Performace Computing

In order to successfully complete this assignment you must do the required reading, watch the provided videos and complete all instructions. The embedded survey form must be entirely filled out and submitted on or before 11:59pm on January 14th. Students must come to class the next day prepared to discuss the material covered in this assignment.

PCA 02: High Performace Computing#

Goals for today’s pre-class assignment#

  1. Introduction to Parallel Programming

  2. How to build a Supercomputer

  3. OnDemand

  4. Test HPC Account

  5. Using git and Jupyter on the HPCC

  6. Assignment wrap up

1. Introduction to Parallel Programming#

Please watch this video to give you a a broad review of some of many of the topics and systems we will be covering and using in this course.

from IPython.display import YouTubeVideo
YouTubeVideo("_3ZymL2msb8",width=640,height=360, cc_load_policy=True)

2. How to build a Supercomputer#

Your instructor submitted a request to get you an account on the MSU High Performance Computer (HPC). The following videos try to explain the system and how to gain access. We will be using these accounts in class. See if you can log in (It is okay if you can’t, the accounts may not be set up yet).

from IPython.display import YouTubeVideo
YouTubeVideo("6oyoS-ddUH0",width=640,height=360, cc_load_policy=True)

Most of the “real” work we will be doing in class will use remote computing resources. many of these recourses have web interfaces which are easy to access and include:

✅ DO THIS: These Videos uses a lot of jargon. Add words and phrases to the course Jargon Jar

3. OnDemand#

In addition to making your code go faster we can use a faster computer…

The HPCC has a new interface called OpenOnDemand. You can log into OpenOnDemand using your MSU netid and password (using Google MSU account) and you will get to a website interface that has everything you need to work on the HPCC. Here is a video introducing you to OpenOnDemand:

from IPython.display import YouTubeVideo
YouTubeVideo("FMxa72hg3PA",width=640,height=360, cc_load_policy=True)

✅ QUESTION: Are you able to log on to the HPCC and if not, where did you get stuck?

Put your answer to the above question here

4. Test HPC Account#

✅ DO THIS: Follow the above video and log on to a development node using http://ondemand.hpcc.msu.edu or by sshing to hpcc.msu.edu laptop. Run the following from a terminal on the HPCC. This will clone the CMSE 401 public repository that contains the code examples that we will be using in this course.

python --version

pip --version

git clone https://github.com/hoolagans/CMSE401_S25_Public

cd CMSE401_S25_Public

ls

Note: the HPCC uses your MSU login and password and scully uses your engineering login and password.

✅ Question: What problems (if any) did you encounter when testing your software?

Put your answer to the above question here

✅ Question: What did you do to try and fix any problems you encountered?

Put your answer to the above question here

5. Using git and Jupyter on the HPCC#

Assuming that you were able to successfully clone the class repository. try running a interactive jupyter server and review some of the course notebook files.

Step 1:#

Go to the “Interactive Applications” and select “Jupyter Notebooks”. For now just use the default settings and hit “Launch”.

Step 2:#

When the connection is made, click on the link for the Jupyter Notebook, navigate to the course website and open up todays assignment.

6. Assignment wrap up#

Please fill out the form that appears when you run the code below. You must completely fill this out in order to receive credits for the assignment!

Direct Link to Form

✅ Assignment-Specific QUESTION: Were you able to successfully log into the HPCC, clone the class repository and get a jupyter server working? If not, where did you get stuck?

Put your answer to the above question here

from IPython.display import HTML
HTML(
"""
<iframe 
	src="https://cmse.msu.edu/cmse401-pc-survey" 
	width="100%" 
	height="500px" 
	frameborder="0" 
	marginheight="0" 
	marginwidth="0">
	Loading...
</iframe>
"""
)

Congratulations, we’re done!#

To get credit for this assignment you must fill out and submit the above survey from on or before the assignment due date.

Written by Dr. Dirk Colbry, Michigan State University (Updated by Dr. Nathan Haut for Spring 2025) Creative Commons License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.