Rocks Cluster Distribution

Rocks Cluster Distribution (originally called NPACI Rocks) is a Linux distribution intended for high-performance computing clusters. It was started by National Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure and the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) in 2000[2] and was initially funded in part by an NSF grant (2000–07)[3] but was funded by the follow-up NSF grant through 2011.[4] Rocks was initially based on the Red Hat Linux distribution, however modern versions of Rocks were based on CentOS, with a modified Anaconda installer that simplifies mass installation onto many computers. Rocks includes many tools (such as MPI) which are not part of CentOS but are integral components that make a group of computers into a cluster.

Rocks Cluster Distribution
DeveloperNational Partnership for Advanced Computational Infrastructure, SDSC, UCSD
OS familyUnix-like
Working stateActive
Source modelOpen source
Latest release7.0 (Manzanita) / December 1, 2017 (2017-12-01)[1]
Available inEnglish
Kernel typeMonolithic (Linux)
LicenseVarious
Official websitewww.rocksclusters.org

Installations can be customized with additional software packages at install-time by using special user-supplied CDs (called "Roll CDs"). The "Rolls" extend the system by integrating seamlessly and automatically into the management and packaging mechanisms used by base software, greatly simplifying installation and configuration of large numbers of computers.[5] Over a dozen Rolls have been created, including the SGE roll, the Condor roll, the Lustre roll, the Java roll, and the Ganglia roll.

By October 2010, Rocks was used for academic, government, and commercial organizations, employed in 1,376 clusters, on every continent except Antarctica.[6] The largest registered academic cluster, having 8632 CPUs, is GridKa, operated by the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology in Karlsruhe, Germany. There are also a number of clusters ranging down to fewer than 10 CPUs, representing the early stages in the construction of larger systems, as well as being used for courses in cluster design. This easy scalability was a major goal in the development of Rocks, both for the researchers involved,[2] and for the NSF:

Broader impact mirrors intellectual merit, and specifically lies in Rocks' new capabilities enabling management of very large clusters such as those emerging from the NSF Track 2 program, the ease of configuration of clusters supporting virtualization capabilities and generally the continuing effect of Rocks on installation and use of Linux clusters across NSF communities.

— SDCI: NMI: Improvement: The Rocks Cluster Toolkit and Extensions to Build User-Defined Cyberenvironments[4]

Release history
Release DateRocks versionCentOS version
Dec 2017Rocks 7.0CentOS 7.4
May 2015Rocks 6.2CentOS 6.6
Apr 2014Rocks 6.1.1CentOS 6.5
Nov 2012Rocks 6.1CentOS 6.3
gollark: Ah.
gollark: It looks like it's doing something ineffable to rsp.
gollark: What's it doing?
gollark: So I'm not sure what you plan to compare it with.
gollark: Well, that's actually one picture.

See also

References
  1. "Rocks 7.0 is Released". www.rocksclusters.org.
  2. "About Rocks Cluster". Rocks Cluster Distribution. Retrieved 2010-10-10.
  3. "Award Abstract #0438741 SCI: Delivering Cyberinfrastructure: From Vision to Reality". National Science Foundation. July 1, 2005. Retrieved 2007-08-05.
  4. "Award Abstract #0721623 SDCI: NMI: Improvement: The Rocks Cluster Toolkit and Extensions to Build User-Defined Cyberenvironments". August 31, 2007. Retrieved June 6, 2013.
  5. "SDSC Enhances Rocks Cluster Management Toolkit". Grid Today. February 16, 2004. Archived from the original on 2007-09-27. Retrieved 2007-08-05.
  6. "Rocks Cluster Register". October 10, 2010.
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