Welcome to Computational Techniques for Life Sciences

What is the Texas Advanced Computing Center?

A little about us:

• We are a research center at UT Austin
• ~160 Staff, 85% funding from external grants
• We support over 10,000 users on ~2,300 active projects

Mission: “To enable discoveries that advance science and society through the application of advanced computing technologies.”

TACC Systems at a Glance

Basic High Performance Computing (HPC) System Architecture

As we log in and prepare to use Stampede2, it is important to understand the basic architecture. Think of an HPC resource as a very large and complicated lab instrument. Users need to learn how to:

• Interface with it / push the right buttons (Linux)
• Load samples (data)
• Run experiments (jobs)
• Interpret the results (data analysis / vis)

Tips for Success

Read the documentation.

• Learn node schematics, limitations, file systems, rules
• Learn about the scheduler, queues, policies
• Determine the right resource for the job

HPC systems are shared resources. Your jobs and activity on a cluster, if mismanaged, can affect others. TACC staff are always available to help.