Student Cluster Competition Selection 2012

A funded seven-day course for undergraduate Computer Science and Electrical Engineering students who wish to advance their expertise in high performance computing (HPC) and participate in the CHPC Student Cluster Competition. 2 July – 8 July 2012 Bloemfontein Hosted by the University of the Free State and the Centre for High Performance Computing (CHPC) of the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) and funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST).

The CHPC invites applications from suitably qualified candidates to attend the above HPC school and enter the competition. Its purpose is to introduce South African students to fundamental knowledge of high performance computing techniques and select regional teams for the CHPC's Student Cluster Competition in December 2012.

The competition and training is only open to South African students enrolled in a computer science related degree who are in 2nd year if enrolled in a 3 year degree, or 2nd/3rd year if enrolled in a 4 year degree1.

The course will cover the concepts and theory of parallel computers, and programming for parallel systems with MPI, OpenMP and CUDA, using the C, Fortran or python programming languages.

The HPC School will take place at the University of the Free State in Bloemfontein. The HPC School will run from Monday 2 July to Saturday 7 July. Cluster competition entrants will then participate immediately at the end of the school on Sunday 8 July in an evaluation and selection process for the December competition.

Outline of syllabus: Day 1: Introduction to HPC Architectures, Parallel Programming Overview. UFS Cluster and CHPC Environment Set-up; Shell Scripting and Job Submission. Day 2: Introduction to Programming Shared Memory Multicore & SMP Systems with OpenMP. Day 3: Parallel Programming Distributed Memory Systems with MPI; Introduction and Fundamentals. Day 4: Advanced Parallel Programming with MPI; Topologies and Parallel I/O. Day 5: GPGPU: Introduction to GPU Programming with CUDA and OpenCL Day 6: HPC Visualization Tools and Applications: Paraview/VTK, OpenFOAM and others. Day 7: Evaluation mini-project and presentations.

1Entrance requirements for this competition are aligned with the International Supercomputing Conference (ISC) Student Cluster Competition rules to ensure that the winners of the CHPC Student Cluster Competition will be eligible to represent the county at ISC'13

2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition Application Form page 1 of 4 Please note that not all attendees of the HPC School will compete in the CHPC Student Cluster Competition in December, however, if you attend the HPC School you must be available to participate in the competition.

In the CHPC Student Cluster Competition participants will build small HPC clusters out of hardware provided by the CHPC. The contest will take place on the exhibition floor at the CHPC National Meeting in Durban, 3–7 December 2012. The participants will be given a selection of applications to optimise and run on their clusters to demonstrate the design’s performance. The winning team will be sent to Germany in June 2013 to represent the country at the ISC Student Cluster Competition.

There are no fees for successful applicants. The CHPC will cover the costs of accommodation during all events as well as air travel and conference fees.

Applicants must meet the following criteria:

1. Hold South African Citizenship 2. Not hold any undergraduate degree 3. If enrolled in a 3 year degree be in 2nd year 4. If enrolled in a 4 year degree be in 2nd or 3rd year 5. Be in good academic standing 6. Be available for the CHPC Student Cluster Competition from 3rd to 7th December 7. Be available to attend ISC in late June 2013 8. Correctly complete the application form Should you wish to participate kindly complete the registration form below, obtain a letter of support from an academic staff member of your faculty and attach your academic transcript.

No prior background in HPC will be assumed. Interactive lectures and computer tutorials will attempt to introduce the students to a range of key aspects of HPC and further illustrate how these tools are currently being applied to address research problems.

Transport, accommodation, and full board will be provided. Owing to budgetary constraints, only limited places are available for suitably qualified students. CLOSING DATE FOR APPLICATIONS: 18h00 Thursday 7 June 2012

Should you wish to become one of the participants, please complete the following application form and email the document back to [email protected] before the closing date. Successful candidates will be notified by Monday 11 June 2012.

The CHPC calls for all talented students to submit their applications. As a public funded institution, the CHPC supports the transformation of South Africa and thus the organisers highly encourage students from previously disadvantaged backgrounds to submit their applications. For general enquiries please email: [email protected]

2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition Application Form page 2 of 4 2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition Application Form

Applicant Details:

Surname:

First name(s):

ID Number:

Country of Citizenship:

Residential Address

Gender:

Ethnicity:

Degree Registered for in 2012:

Degree Duration (Years): 3 / 4 years (delete whichever is inapplicable)

Academic Year: 2nd / 3rd (delete whichever is inapplicable)

Major:

University:

Letter of Support Attached: YES / NO (delete whichever is inapplicable)

Academic Transcript Attached: YES / NO (delete whichever is inapplicable)

Email Address:

Cell Phone Number:

Other Telephone Number:

Explain why you should be considered as one of the participants in the 2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition?

(Not more than 100 words)

Form continues on next page…

Accommodation, Meals, Flights & Transfer

2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition Application Form page 3 of 4 ACCOMMODATION Only student resident style accommodation will be provided during your stay at the HPC School. The lodging will be confirmed closer to the time. Accommodation will be booked from Sunday night (1 July) to the next Sunday night (8 July); checkout is Monday morning (9 July 2012).

Accommodation for the CHPC National Meeting and ISC'13 will be arranged closer to the time with the selected participants.

SPECIAL DIETRY REQUIREMENTS Meals will be provided with accommodation and at the school. Please indicate any special dietary requirements (e.g., vegetarian, Halal, etc.):

Diet restriction:

FLIGHTS Please indicate the South African airport (closest to your place of residence) that you will be departing from and returning to. This has to be the same airport as we will book a return flight from that airport to the Bloemfontein International Airport only.

Home airport

TRANSFERS The CHPC is only paying for transfers from the Bloemfontein International Airport to the accommodation and return. All students have to arrange their own transfers to and from their home airport. If any students have special transfer requests please advise now in order to make the necessary arrangements:

Special transfer

CLOSING DATE FOR APPLICATIONS: Thursday 7 June 2012

2012 CHPC Student Cluster Competition Application Form page 4 of 4