CSAR Bulletin issued in December 2005

CSAR Service during Christmas

The University of Manchester will be closed from Friday 23rd December to Monday 2nd January inclusive. However the CSAR Helpdesk will be operating an email only service on the following dates: Friday 23rd December, Wednesday 28th December, Thursday 29th December and Friday 30th December.

newt15 queue on Newton

We would like to remind you that the newt15 queue is available on Newton for the use of its 1.5 GHz processors. The performance relative to the extra cost per CPU hour is better for many codes and you may also find that the processors are more readily available than the 1.3 GHz ones (particularly over the Christmas period)- thus reducing wait times for jobs up to 128 PEs. To use the newt15 queue please add the -q newt15 option to bsub.

NGS User Forum

The National Grid Service has now been in full production since September 2004 and currently has over 300 registered users. With users from a diverse range of academic disciplines and a growing number of resource providers, the NGS is looking towards the future. The first NGS user forum is meeting to bring together existing and potential NGS users and providers, to share experiences, understand future plans and provide an opportunity to influence the development of the NGS provision through the next few years.

The current agenda for the day is to discuss what the NGS currently provides, experiences from current users and a look to the future with respect to wider integration and the next Phase of NGS resource deployment. An open discussion section will allow all participants the opportunity to discuss their own experiences and requirements for the future.

Please see http://www.ngs.ac.uk/event.html for further details and to register.

CSAR User Survey 2005

The seventh CSAR User Survey is now available online at http://www.csar.cfs.ac.uk/project_management/user_survey.shtml.

We hope that you will find the time to contribute to the survey to help us improve the service. The form has been designed to gather views on a variety of topics and has ample space for comment. As in previous years there will be a prize draw, the winner of which will receive a bottle of malt whiskey (or agreed alternative). The deadline for submission is Friday 16th December.