Do you want to secure a place in HPC history? One route would be to singlehandedly design and implement an exascale supercomputer, a task most would categorize as “hard.”
But an easier route is to participate in the various Student Cluster Competitions that take place around the world. At SCCs, undergraduate student teams build their own HPC clusters and compete live against other universities to see which cluster offers the best performance.
It’s a great learning experience for all involved. The students get to build their own true supercomputer, run real HPC applications on it, and meet students and HPC professionals from around the world.
There are three ways to be involved. The first is to be associated with a university, put together a team, and launch them into the SCC fray. Students can also organize their own teams, recruit an advisor, and jump into the competitions. The third route is for an HPC vendor to contact a university and help them get into the competitions.
Whatever your route, the best first step is to listen to this podcast we recently recorded with current (and former) team advisors and the current SC16 Cluster Competition committee head, Purdue’s Stephen Harrell.
You’ll learn everything about starting your own Student Cluster Competition team including how to get your academic institution on board, how to get the hardware, how to get financial support for your team, and how to train your students without the use of HPC performance-enhancing substances. (These competitions are clean, damn it…other than massive amounts of caffeine, of course.)
If you want to compete at SC16 in beautiful Salt Lake City, there’s time; the application process still has a month to run. For more information, check out the link here. If you’ve definitely decided you want a chance at HPC immortality, or simply have some questions, shoot them an email at: student-cluster-competition@info.supercomputing.org.
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Tagged: supercomputing, Student Cluster Competition, HPC, SCC, SC16