Different Workloads on HPC

The training focuses on different ways to allocate resources on supercomputers and parallelisation schemes used to speed up calculations.

Modern supercomputers are massive parallel machines with up to hundreds of cores on a single node and even thousands of nodes connected via fast network interface. To utilise those machines fully, one needs to know about parallelisation techniques and queuing system options of resource allocation. This training will show different ways that Slurm allocates resources and how to apply them to different computations and workloads.

Level

Target audience

Training is intended for users who have started running their own calculations and need to learn about different methods of allocating resources at ACC Cyfronet AGH. 

Agenda

1. Introduction - serial vs parallel,
2. processes, htop and interactive access to a job:
   1. processes vs threads,
   2. OpenMP vs MPI,
   3. hybrid execution,
   4. mpirun vs srun;
3. binaries - OpenMP, MPI, both, neither? - how to check app's libraries,
4. limits of parallelism - matching execution to algorithm,
5. GROMACS - one application, countless execution methods,
6. accelerating GROMACS with a GPU card,
7. Q&A (15 min).

Requirements

We recommend participating in this training after completing Running Calculations the HPC way training provided at ACC Cyfronet AGH.

Summary of prerequisites

1. PLGrid account,
2. active affiliation,
3. accepting invitation to resources at least a day before training starts,
4. attending the Dry-run,
5. computer equipped with SSH connection.

PLGrid Account

Specify your PLGrid username in the registration form. If you don't have an account, please follow one of our guides:
* https://guide.plgrid.pl/en/portal-for-science/profile,
* https://guide.plgrid.pl/en/portal-for-business/account.

Affiliation

• Check status or activate at https://portal.plgrid.pl/users/affiliations.
• Any researcher affiliated with a Polish academic or scientific institution can access these resources free of charge. The process to obtain an affiliation is fast and can be done through PLGrid Portal alone.
• For participants from industry, business, and commercial entities without an active commercial affiliation, to speed up the activation process, please contact us at training@cyfronet.pl. We will grant you a short-lived affiliation for training purposes.
• This course is co-funded by the European Union. Therefore, the course is open for participants from academia, industry, and public administration from the Member States (MS) of the European Union (EU) and Associated/Other Countries to the Horizon Europe programme.
• In case you have problems, obtaining an affiliation, please contact the organizers at training@cyfronet.pl.

Invitation to resources

• Couple of days before the training, Training Team will be sending invitations to resources in PLGrid Portal at https://portal.plgrid.pl/training_invitations.
• Accepting the invitation allows users to use the resources of the training grant.
• Make sure to activate all the required services too (they are listed on the page of the invitation). Use "participation in a training" as motivation if need be.

Dry-run

• On 26th Oct 2026 at 10:00-11:00 CET, a Dry-run will be held. Attendance will be marked based on Zoom participant list.
• Participants will learn how to log in to the Ares supercomputer before the training and resolve any problems with the Training Team.
• In case you cannot come to the dry-run, please inform us directly at training@cyfronet.pl, otherwise your registration will be cancelled.
• Please attend the dry-run even if your affiliation is not active.

SSH connection

Participants' computers should be equipped with software that allows SSH connections. On Windows, it is recommended to use Windows Terminal (not to be confused with Powershell after checking if OpenSSH is installed (run ssh -V in the terminal). We advise against using Putty.

Venue

The workshop will be conducted online on the Zoom platform. The meeting link will be sent to registered participants.

Language

English

Duration

3 hours

Registration and eligibility

The Registration and the Waiting list close automatically at 23:59 CEST on 22nd Oct 2026. The Registration may close prematurely if the limit number of participants is hit beforehand, but the Waiting List will be available until the deadline above.

Please use your institution's e-mail address. Registrations using generic or private email addresses cannot be accepted. At that e-mail address, you will be contacted with further information.

This course is co-funded by the European Union. Therefore, the course is open for participants from academia, industry, and public administration from the Member States (MS) of the European Union (EU) and Associated/Other Countries to the Horizon Europe programme.

Organized by

Funded by

Acknowledgements
EuroCC 3 has received funding from the European High-Performance Computing Joint Undertaking (JU) under Grant Agreement No. 101306701. The JU receives support from the European Union‘s Digital Europe Programme and Germany, Albania, Austria, Belgium, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czechia, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Montenegro, the Netherlands, North Macedonia, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Türkiye, and Kosovo.