MSc 2009/2010 Overview
Dr David Henty
MSc Programme Director
Email: d.henty@epcc.ed.ac.uk)
http://www.epcc.ed.ac.uk/msc
September 2009
MSc: Induction
1
Background
• MSc builds on EPCC’s long training history
– initially funded by 5-year Masters Training Package (MTP) from
EPSRC
– EPSRC: Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council
– continued under High-End Computing (HEC) scheme
– began in 2001, this is the ninth year that it has been offered
– longer-term support from the School of Physics and Astronomy,
the University’s Collaborative Training Account (CTA) and the
Postgraduate Students' Allowances Scheme (PSAS)
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Aims
• To teach practical skills
– not just theory
• In areas relevant to EPCC’s HPC activities
– in academic research
– in industry
• This involves a number of areas
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parallel programming
software development
new architectures and languages
distributed computing
...
September 2009
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Hidden Aims
• To get to know potential EPCC employees
– you!
– currently employ seven of our own MSc students from
past years
• To continue our training activities
• To do accredited teaching at a postgraduate level
• Job satisfaction
– we enjoy teaching courses
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Structure
MSc in
HPC
Computational Science
Physical
Sciences
Theory
September 2009
Computer
Science
Simulation
Applied
MSc: Induction
Pure
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People
• Programme Director
– David Henty, room 2254
• Director of Studies
– Judy Hardy, room 3403
• Programme Adminstrator
– Crystal Lei, School of Physics and Astronomy Teaching Office,
room 4314
• Each course taught by a range of EPCC staff
– with a single course organiser in charge of content and assessment
• External examiner
– Dr Tony Arber, Centre for Scientific Computing, University of Warwick
• Chair of Board of Examiners
– Prof Graeme Ackland, School of Physics, Edinburgh
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Information
• Student handbook is the main source
– an evolving document, but please read the printed copy
– kept up-to-date on the WWW
• We have WWW pages for internal information
– https://www2.epcc.ed.ac.uk/msc/students/
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Format of EPCC Courses
• Courses are taught over 11 weeks
– courses assessed by coursework will finish lectures around week 5 or 6
• Normally take six courses in each of two semesters
– most EPCC courses taught in same half-day slot (morning/afternoon) on
same day each week
– courses from other programmes may run on two different days each week
• Almost all courses are dedicated to MSc students
– including students from other programmes
– Distributed Computing MSc, Maths Operational Research MSc,
Informatics MSc (HPC Specialism), fifth-year Computational Physics
MPhys students, ...
• Class numbers are relatively small
– training room can accommodate around 26 people
• Please ask questions
– take advantage of the relatively small classes
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Training Room
• The main training facility for the MSc
– 26 Sun Ray terminals with dual-processor Sun server (training.epcc)
• Room is often used outside of MSc courses
– check the EPCC room booking system
– you can use the public access PCs with UNIX via eXceed
– or your own laptop and wireless
• You will each have your own smartcard
– allows you to access the Sun Ray terminals
– we will have to charge if you lose it!
• Ground rules
– always arrive promptly for courses
– do NOT use your terminal during lectures for reading email etc
– ask questions!
September 2009
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Ness Sun HPC System
• ness is the key HPC resource for the MSc
– a significant amount of computing power
– a cluster of SunFire x4600 servers
– total of 32 Opteron processing cores (each @2.6 GHz)
– soon to include a number of Tesla GPU boards
• A number of other HPC systems are hosted at the
University’s Advanced Computing Facility (ACF)
– located just south of Edinburgh
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Other ACF Machines: QCDoC
• Quantum ChromoDynamics on a Chip
– Performance: 11 TFlops (14,000 special-purpose CPUs)
– Note: uses chips specifically designed by IBM, University of
Edinburgh and Columbia
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IBM BlueGene
• Performance:
– 5.6 TFlops
– 2048 PowerPCs
• Notes:
– first BlueGene in Europe
– low power requirements and
high density of processors
– extreme scaling
– hundreds of thousands of
processors
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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HPCx
• The current National UK Supercomputer
– http://www.hpcx.ac.uk/
– initial service in December 2002 with 1280 CPUs@1.3GHz
– now in its final phase with 2560 CPUs
• A six-year contract for £53 million (€ 74M)
– includes hardware and support staff
– roughly eight staff at EPCC
– consortium of EPCC, Daresbury Laboratory and IBM
– lead by the University of Edinburgh
– machine physically located at Daresbury laboratory
September 2009
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The HPCx Consortium
September 2009
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HPCx
September 2009
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HECToR: Cray XT4
September 2009
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HECToR service
• Operated by EPCC / University of Edinburgh
– located at the ACF
– owned by EPSRC
– www.hector.ac.uk
• The UK flagship national supercomputer service
– over 22,000 processing cores!
– currently ten times more powerful than HPCx
– total cost in excess of £100M over six years
• Running for 2 years now
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Real machine
September 2009
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Cray spaghetti
September 2009
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Books
• We have reading lists for each course
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including at least one book
copies of all books available for review only from Judy’s office
we do not expect you to buy lots of books
many are available online
– or in the library
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Programming
• Knowledge of UNIX is essential
– as a user only - University provides basic material
• You will be doing a lot of programming
– courses are practical-based
• You must be confident with
– the language itself
– the tools
– organising your programming work
• Writing working programs is NOT enough
– you must look at their performance (speed, efficiency ...) as well
– this makes HPC research more like an experimental science
September 2009
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Programming Languages for MSc
• Everyone should be confident in either C or Fortran
– essential for Message-Passing Programming, Shared
Memory Programming, Parallel Decomposition
– useful for Applied Numerical Algorithms
– Fortran knowledge required for Parallel Decomposition
– training provided in Tools and Techniques and at start of course
• Need Java for Object Oriented Programming for HPC
– check requirements for non-EPCC course options
• We will not be teaching C
– Java programmers advised to learn Fortran
– Fortran programmers should learn Java
– C programmers learn basic Fortran and perhaps Java
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Compulsory EPCC Courses
• Semester 1
• FC
Fundamental Concepts of HPC
• SMP
• MPP
Shared Memory Programming
• SD
Practical Software Development
Message Passing Programming
• Semester 2
• AT
Advanced Topics in HPC and e-Science
• PP
September 2009
HPC Project Preparation
MSc: Induction
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Optional EPCC Courses
• Semester 1
• ANA
Applied Numerical Algorithms
• TT
Tools and Techniques for HPC Programming
• Semester 2
• PD
Parallel Decomposition
• HCPP
• OOP
• PSMA
Hardware, Compilers and Performance Programming
• CSTA
Computer Simulation using HPC: Techniques and
Object Oriented Programming for HPC
Performance Scaling on Modern HPC Architectures
Applications
September 2009
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Options from Other Programmes
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Informatics courses
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Distributed Scientific Computing (DSC) MSc
DAPA
Design and Analysis of Parallel Algorithms
AD
Applied Databases
CN
Computer Networking
BI01
Bioinformatics 1
BI02
Bioinformatics 2
WP
Web Programming
CDR
Computing with Distributed Resources
IP
Internet Computing
September 2009
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Choices
• This year’s programme offers quite a few choices
– both within MSc in HPC and from other programmes
• Normally a maximum of three non-EPCC courses
• Students choices must be confirmed by Director of Studies
– check for any clashes or pre-requisite knowledge
– detailed programme in the handbook
• Certain themes are outlined in the handbook
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Timetable
• Semester 1 before Christmas, Semester 2 after Christmas
• See the handbook for details
– exams happen at the end of each semester
• Most EPCC Teaching takes place in half day slots (except Wed PM)
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teaching takes place in the EPCC training room, 3305
standard morning slot starts at 09:15 and finishes at 12:45
standard afternoon slot starts at 14:00 and finishes at 17:30
half-hour coffee / tea breaks in middle of each session
an hour lunch break
sessions are a mixture of lectures and tutored practical sessions
• Each course organiser will say if their timetable is different from above
– Other programmes will have their own timetables – see their WWW pages
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Assessment Mechanisms
• Mixture of coursework, exams and dissertation
– EPCC courses are assessed entirely be coursework or entirely by
examination
– Informatics and DSC courses may be assessed using both
• If there is a coursework, teaching makes up first half of the semester
– second half left free of lectures to allow time for coursework
– any associated tutorials will take place in the usual weekly slot
• Students passing the taught part then do a dissertation
– independent project which takes 16 weeks
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Marking Breakdown
• MSc comprises 180 credits
– each course is 10 credits
– either a piece of coursework or a 2-hour exam
• Normal breakdown
– Semester 1
– Semester 2
– Dissertation
60 credits
60 credits
60 credits
• All taught courses have equal weight
• Progression to MSc dissertation based on performance in taught courses
– Diploma based purely on taught part
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Deadlines
• Coursework submission is 100% online: Course Submission Tool
– www.ph.ed.ac.uk/cst/
– this allows us to mark anonymously
• All courseworks will have a deadline
– normally 12:00 on a Friday
– we will deduct marks for late submission to ensure fairness
– you are given lots of time free of teaching to do this work
• Lose 5 marks of per working day
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or fraction of a working day
imagine a report is worthy of 55%
if handed in at lunchtime on Tuesday it is 2 working days late
and would be awarded 45% (55 – 2*5 = 55-10)
• Note that 8pm on Friday means 5% reduction
– the same as 4pm the following Monday
September 2009
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Plagiarism
• Please read the guidelines
– copying other people’s work is not acceptable
• We use plagiarism detection software
– for both written reports and for submitted code
• If in doubt then
– ask for advice
– make it clear which work is yours
• This is an extremely important issue
– we give guidance here and as part of HPC Project Preparation
September 2009
MSc: Induction
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Social Side
• EPCC is a very social place
• We want you to feel welcome
– use the coffee room
– come to buns (free cakes!) on Friday to meet people
– attend any social events, talks etc that you want to
• The email address all@epcc.ed.ac.uk contains everyone
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staff
students
visitors (eg from European programme HPC-Europa)
msc-students@epcc contains HPC students only
• Take a chance to enjoy Edinburgh
– many historic sites, galleries, museums, walks, ...
– eg many buildings open to the public on Doors Open Day
– 26-27 September 2009
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Tonight
• Table at Mamma’s pizza place in town centre: 7.30pm
– a selection of starters, and pizzas for main course, for around £8
September 2009
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Tonight
• Table at Mamma’s pizza place in town centre: 7.30pm
– a selection of starters, and pizzas for main course, for around £8
September 2009
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