Downloads

ISO images for i386 and x86_64 architectures can be found here.

New Features

1. Xen Support

You can use the Xen Roll to create ‘VM Containers’: physical machines that are used to hold Xen-based virtual machines. The Rocks Command Line was expanded to help build and maintain VMs (e.g., “rocks create host vm compute-0-0-0″ is used to install a VM).

2. Fully-Programmable Partitioning

The partitioning of client nodes (e.g., compute nodes and tile nodes) has been retooled. You can supply Red Hat partitioning directives to any node by writing a program in the “pre” section which populates the file “/tmp/user_partitioning_info”. The program can be as simple as small bash script that echos Red Hat partitioning directives or as complex as a python program that outputs partitioning info based on: the node’s name, the node’s membership, the number of disks in the node or the type of disks in the node. See the Base Roll documentation for details.

Enhancements

• OS: Based on CentOS release 5/update 1 and all updates as of April 29, 2008
• Condor: updated to v7.0.1
• Ganglia: Ganglia Monitor Core updated to v3.0.7
• Ganglia: phpsysinfo updated to v2.5.4
• Ganglia: rrdtool updated to v1.2.23
• HPC: The HPC roll is now optional. You can build a bare-bones cluster by using only the Kernel Roll, OS Rolls (disk 1 and 2) and the Base Roll
• HPC: MPICH updated to v1.2.7 patch 1)
• HPC: MPICH2 added to the roll (v1.0.6 patch 1)
• HPC: OpenMPI added to the roll (v1.2.6)
• SGE: SGE updated to 6.1 update 4
• SGE: Added tight integration for SGE and OpenMPI
• Area51: chkrootkit updated to v0.48
• Area51: tripwire updated to v2.4.1.2
• Bio: Biopython updated to v1.45
• Bio: Clustalw updated to v2.0.5
• Bio: Fasta updated to v35.3.5
• Bio: NCBI toolbox updated to Mar’ 2008 version
• Bio: MpiBlast updated to v1.5.0-pio and is patched against the NCBI toolbox Mar’ 2008 version
• Bio: Phylip updated to v3.67
• Bio: T_coffee updated to v5.65
• Bio: Gromacs and MrBayes are now MPI Enabled and compiled against rocks-openmpi

Downloads

• Jumbo Roll (Base, Bio, Condor, Ganglia, HPC, Java, Kernel, OS disk 1 and 2, SGE, Web Server) i386 (dvd)
• Jumbo Roll (Base, Bio, Condor, Ganglia, HPC, Java, Kernel, OS disk 1 and 2, SGE, Web Server) x86_64 (dvd)
• OS Jumbo Roll (All 6 OS Rolls) i386 (dvd)
• OS Jumbo Roll (All 7 OS Rolls) x86_64 (dvd)
• Individual Rolls
• MD5 checksums

Caveat

For compute nodes, ALL disks will be repartitioned and reformatted.

To only format the root disk, before you install any compute nodes, execute:

• cd /home/install/site-profiles/5.0/nodes/
• wget http://www.rocksclusters.org/ftp-site/pub/rocks/beta/5.0/replace-partition.xml
• cd /home/install
• rocks-dist dist

Notes on Some of the New Features

• Xen Support

If you include the Xen roll, you will now be able to configure Xen images using Rocks.

After you bring up the frontend, you will want to configure a “VM Container”. A VM Container is a physical node that hosts Xen VMs. Execute “insert-ethers”, then select “VM Container” as the appliance type. Then PXE boot the physical node.

After the VM Container is installed, you can create VMs inside the VM Container. To configure your first VM, on the frontend execute:

# rocks add host vm vm-container-0-0 membership=compute

Where “vm-container-0-0″ is the name of the physical VM Container and “membership=compute” associates a compute appliance with the newly added VM. By default, Rocks will assign the name “compute-0-0-0″ to the new VM.

Then, you’ll need to reconfigure and restart all Rocks services by executing:

# rocks sync config

Now, let’s install the VM:

# rocks create host vm compute-0-0-0

You can monitor the installation by executing:

# rocks-console compute-0-0-0

After the installation completes, boot the VM by executing:

# rocks start host vm compute-0-0-0

After the VM boots, you will be able to login to the compute VM just like a physical compute node. Also, if you installed SGE, you will be schedule jobs on the compute VM.

To see all the new Rocks VM commands, execute:

# rocks | grep vm

Clustercorp has released the first Absoft Roll (for Rocks 4.3 x86_84), which includes the Absoft Pro Fortran v10.1 Compiler Suite and associated libraries for x86_64 systems.

Clustercorp has released the first AMD Roll (for Rocks 4.3 x86_84), which includes GNU compilers optimized for AMD “Barcelona” CPUs (see http://developer.amd.com/tools/gcctools/) for details on included packages.

Clustercorp has updated the Cisco-OFED Roll to version 1.2.5 (for Rocks 4.3 x86_84). The Roll installs and configures Cisco’s OFED-based Infiniband driver stack and MPI layer as provided in the Cisco-OFED 1.2.5 RPMS and source code.

See the Clustercorp Roll Downloads Page to obtain the Rolls:

http://www.clustercorp.com/rolls/

Clustercorp has updated the Intel Developer Roll to version 10.1 (for Rocks 4.3 x86_84). It includes Intel C, C++, Fortran compilers, runtime components, and developer tools. This Roll also enables users to deploy Intel Cluster Ready solutions with Rocks+.

The PGI Roll has been updated to version 7.1.3 (for Rocks 4.3 x86_84). It includes PGI C, C++, and Fortran compilers and development tools from the Portland Group.

See the Clustercorp Roll Downloads Page to obtain the Rolls:

http://www.clustercorp.com/rolls/

APBS (Adaptive Poisson-Boltzmann Solver) is a scalable Poisson-Boltzmann equation solver used to study electrostatic properties of small to nanoscale biomolecular systems. The APBS Roll simplifies APBS deployment and integration on Rocks clusters. More information about APBS can be found at SourceForge or at the NBCR web site.

This APBS Roll contains the latest APBS version 0.5.1 and PDB2PQR package version 1.2.1.

The APBS Roll can be downloaded from the APBS download site and the Roll documentation including installation and usage information is available here.

Questions or comments may be directed to Robert Konecny < rok@ucsd.edu>.

Clustercorp has released the Intel Developer Roll for Rocks 4.3 x86_64 which includes Intel C, C++, Fortran compilers, Runtime Components, and Developer Tools. This Roll also enables end-users and partners to deploy Intel Cluster Ready solutions with Rocks+, contact Clustercorp for details.

The Cisco-OFED Roll is now out of beta and is available as a general release. The Roll installs and configures Cisco’s OFED-based Infiniband driver stack and MPI layer as provided in the Cisco-OFED 1.2 RPMS and source code. This Roll has replaced Clustercorp’s Cisco Topspin Roll.

Please see the Clustercorp Roll Downloads Page to obtain the Roll.

ThaiGrid proudly presents: the ANImation STudio (ANIST) Roll, a Roll that will transform your cluster into 3D Animation Render Farm!

Downloads

• i386, MD5 checksum (e371ba87f013e83d5959deaa1d303e6a)
• x86_64, MD5 checksum (ea070472e31b7ef2244e9f4802ded8ad)

Release Notes

• Includes several open-source 3D renderers: Blender 2.44, YafRay 0.0.9 (can be invoked from Blender), Pixie 2.2.2, Povray 3.6, MegaPov 1.2.1
• Partial support for Autodesk® Maya® installation
• Includes ILM’s OpenEXR support
• Includes DrQeueue 0.64.3, a render farm manager with graphical job submission
• An Animation Workstation node type, let’s your Rocks frontend control your design station
• Includes Samba support for workgroup file sharing
• Movie and sound players/editors: mplayer, ffmpeg, lame, faac, a52dec, Ogg and Vorbis, Theora, xvidcore, x264

Please consult included documentation for instruction and usage.

Please feel free to report bugs and send us feedback and comments.

The development of this Roll is a collaboration between ROCKS and Thai National Grid Center, a member of SIPA, succeeding collaboration in PRAGMA grid project.

If you are attending the show, please stop by, say hello, also attend the Rocks BoF at 12:15pm on Weds. If you would like to have a meeting with any of the Rocks group please send an email to sc07@rocksclusters.org so we can schedule accordingly.

You can view the current SC|07 schedule of the Rocks group on our calendar.

The long awaited pbs-roll release 4.3.0 is now ready for download.

Release notes

• Torque upgraded to v2.1.8.
• mpiexec upgraded to v0.82 + mvapich 0.9.9 support patch. mpiexec is now located under /opt/mpiexec to avoid clashing with openmpi.
• maui is upgraded to v3.2.6p19.
• Some system and ulimit parameters have been increased to support larger cluster sizes.

Upgrading the roll without reinstalling the frontend should work as earlier, see Steve Jones’s recipe.

Future plans

This will most probably be the last major release under the pbs-roll name. The plan is to rename the roll to torque-roll to better describe what software the roll actually contains. The name change will be completed with the arrival of the Rocks v5.

Clusterresources.com, the developers and maintainers of torque and maui, will be involved in future releases. The hope is to establish a closer collaboration to speed up the development of the roll.

All Rocks users are encouraged to subscribe to this calendar. There is a button on the bottom right of this page, or you can just click on the button below.