Lattice Gauge Theory at Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL)

The CL Allocator can be used to allocate, renew and release QCDOC machine partitions. It is the replacement of the Web Allocator. It is available on both front-end hosts (qcdochosta and qcdochostb).
As with the Web Allocator, users belong to groups that give them permissions to allocate partitions.
Partitions reserved for PBS jobs cannot be allocated using the Command Line Allocator.

Allocating a Machine Partition

All executables are under /usr/local/bin. The allocate command allocates a machine partition:

allocate <machine_partition> <number_of_hours>

machine_partition: the machine partition to be allocated, such as acc7/slot0, rack20-23, etc.
hours_to_allocate: the number of hours the machine partition is being allocated for.
If set to 0 the machine partition will be allocated indefinitely.
General Purpose partitions, such as ACC partitions, cannot be allocated indefinitely (up to 16 hrs).

Examples

allocate acc7/slot0 2
allocate rack20-23 0

Renewing the allocation of a partition

To renew (extend or shorten) the allocation of a machine partition simply use the allocation command. All it does is replaces the existing allocation with the new one. For example, to replace the existing allocation on acc5/slot1 with a new one, use:
allocate acc5/slot1 3

Releasing a partition

The release will release the allocation of a machine partition. Currently, releasing a machine partition does not kill the qdaemon or qcsh processes.

release <machine_partition>

machine_partition: the machine partition to be released, such as acc5/slot0, rack24-27, etc.

Example

release rack4-27