Chapter 2 Starting Sun MPI Programs

This chapter explains the basic steps for starting up message-passing programs on a Sun HPC cluster using the services provided by the CRE.

Logging In

Logging in to a Sun HPC 3.0 cluster is the same as logging in to any Sun server. That is, to log in on your local machine, just supply your user name at the login prompt and, if a password is required, the password. For remote logins, use rlogin.

This differs from the login model found in the Sun HPC RTE 2.0 environment, which was based on two special login commands tmlogin and tmtelnet. In that model, you were expected to specify the name of the cluster that you wanted to be on.

You receive the standard Solaris login information, followed by a Solaris prompt:

Sun Microsystems Inc.   SunOS 5.6       Generic March 1999
Users: wmitty jthurb
node0%

You are now logged in to a node whose hostname is node0.

After Logging In

Once you are logged in to a Sun HPC cluster, you can issue any Solaris or Sun HPC commands, and you can execute any programs that will execute under Solaris 2.6 or Solaris 7 operating environments. See Chapter 3, Executing Programs for more information about job execution.

Writing Programs

You can perform program development on a Sun HPC cluster node or you can do it on any computer running a compatible Solaris operating environment.

Compiling and Linking Programs

If your program uses Sun HPC ClusterTools components, you must compile and link your program on a cluster that contains the ClusterTools software.

If you plan to use Prism to debug your program, include the -g option when you compile your program.

See the Sun S3L 3.0 Programming and Reference Guide and the Sun MPI 4.0 Programming and Reference Guide for information on linking in the Sun S3L and the Sun MPI libraries.

Issuing CRE Commands

The CRE provides commands that allow you to execute programs and obtain information about cluster resources and job activity. This section provides general information about issuing these commands. The commands are discussed in detail in the next two chapters.

The CRE commands are typically in the directory /opt/SUNWhpc/bin. If you are unable to execute them, you may need to add this directory to your path; check with your system administrator. The man pages for Sun HPC commands are in

/opt/SUNWhpc/man

If you cannot display these man pages, you may need to add this directory to your manpath.

CRE commands take options that consist of a dash followed by one or two letters. You can combine single-letter options that don't take arguments so long as they don't create ambiguity with multiletter options. For example, the command

% mprun -B -J

can also be written as

% mprun -BJ

Logging Out

To log out of the Sun HPC cluster, issue the command

% logout