[Commits] [svn:einsteintoolkit] www/about/releases/ (Rev. 742)
schnetter at cct.lsu.edu
schnetter at cct.lsu.edu
Tue Oct 25 16:00:57 CDT 2011
User: eschnett
Date: 2011/10/25 04:00 PM
Modified:
/about/releases/
ET_2011_10_announcement.php
Log:
Reword release notes
File Changes:
Directory: /about/releases/
===========================
File [modified]: ET_2011_10_announcement.php
Delta lines: +84 -39
===================================================================
--- about/releases/ET_2011_10_announcement.php 2011-10-25 20:57:05 UTC (rev 741)
+++ about/releases/ET_2011_10_announcement.php 2011-10-25 21:00:57 UTC (rev 742)
@@ -1,19 +1,58 @@
<?php $title='Release Announcement';
include_once($_SERVER['DOCUMENT_ROOT'].'/global/header.php');?>
-<p>We are pleased to announce the fourth release (code name "<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Clerk_Maxwell">Maxwell</a>") of the Einstein Toolkit, an open, community developed software infrastructure for relativistic astrophysics. This release includes substantial changes to the underlying AMR infrastructure Carpet and the simfactory tool. GRHydro is now officially released with support for magnetohydrodynamics. In addition, bug fixes accumulated since the previous release in April 2011 have been included.</p>
+<p>We are pleased to announce the fourth release (code name
+"<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Clerk_Maxwell">Maxwell</a>")
+of the Einstein Toolkit, an open, community developed software
+infrastructure for relativistic astrophysics. This release includes
+substantial changes to the underlying AMR infrastructure Carpet and
+the Simfactory tool. GRHydro now officially supports
+magnetohydrodynamics. In addition, many errors have been corrected
+since the previous release in April 2011.</p>
-<p>The Einstein Toolkit is a collection of software components and tools for simulating and analyzing general relativistic astrophysical systems that builds on numerous software efforts in the numerical relativity community including CactusEinstein, the Carpet AMR infrastructure and the relativistic hydrodynamics code GRHydro (an updated and extended version of the public release of the Whisky code). The Cactus Framework is used as the underlying computational infrastructure providing large-scale parallelization, general computational components, and a model for collaborative, portable code development. The toolkit includes modules to build complete codes for simulating black hole spacetimes as well as systems governed by relativistic hydrodynamics.</p>
+<p>The Einstein Toolkit is a collection of software components and
+tools for simulating and analyzing general relativistic astrophysical
+systems. It builds on numerous software efforts in the numerical
+relativity community including CactusEinstein, the Carpet AMR
+infrastructure, and the relativistic hydrodynamics code GRHydro. The
+Cactus Framework is used as the underlying computational
+infrastructure providing large-scale parallelization, general
+computational components, and a model for collaborative, portable code
+development. The toolkit includes modules to build complete codes for
+simulating black hole spacetimes as well as systems governed by
+relativistic hydrodynamics.</p>
-<p>The Einstein Toolkit uses a distributed software model and its different modules are developed, distributed, and supported either by the core team of Einstein Toolkit Maintainers, or by individual groups. Where modules are provided by external groups, the Einstein Toolkit Maintainers provide quality control for modules for inclusion in the toolkit and help coordinate support. The Einstein Toolkit Maintainers currently involve postdocs and faculty from five different institutions, and host weekly meetings that are open for anyone to join in.</p>
+<p>The Einstein Toolkit uses a distributed software model, and its
+different modules are developed, distributed, and supported either by
+the core team of Einstein Toolkit Maintainers, or by individual
+research groups. Where modules are provided by external groups, the
+Einstein Toolkit Maintainers provide quality control for modules for
+inclusion in the toolkit and help coordinate support. The Einstein
+Toolkit Maintainers currently involve postdocs and faculty from five
+different institutions, and host weekly meetings that are open for
+anyone to join.</p>
-<p>Guiding principles for the design and implementation of the toolkit include: open, community-driven software development; well thought out and stable interfaces; separation of physics software from computational science infrastructure; provision of complete working production code; training and education for a new generation of researchers.</p>
+<p>Guiding principles for the design and implementation of the toolkit
+include: open, community-driven software development; well thought-out
+and stable interfaces; separation of physics software from
+computational science infrastructure; provision of a complete working
+production code; and training and education for a new generation of
+researchers.</p>
-<p>For more information about using or contributing to the Einstein Toolkit, or to join the Einstein Toolkit Consortium, please visit our web pages at <<a href="http://einsteintoolkit.org">http://einsteintoolkit.org</a>>.</p>
+<p>For more information about using or contributing to the Einstein
+Toolkit, or to join the Einstein Toolkit Consortium, please visit our
+web pages at
+<<a href="http://einsteintoolkit.org">http://einsteintoolkit.org</a>>.</p>
-<p>The Einstein Toolkit is primarily supported by NSF 0903973/0903782/0904015 (CIGR), and also by NSF 0701566/0855892 (XiRel), 0721915 (Alpaca), 0905046/0941653 (PetaCactus) and 0710874 (LONI Grid).</p>
+<p>The Einstein Toolkit is primarily supported by NSF
+0903973/0903782/0904015 (CIGR), and also by NSF 0701566/0855892
+(XiRel), 0721915 (Alpaca), 0905046/0941653 (PetaCactus), and 0710874
+(LONI).</p>
-<p>The Einstein Toolkit thorns contain over 130 regression test cases. On a large portion of the tested machines, all of these testsuites <a href="http://einsteintoolkit.org/release-info/parse_testsuite_results.php">pass</a>, using both MPI and OpenMP.</p>
+<p>The Einstein Toolkit thorns contain over 130 regression test cases.
+On a large portion of the tested machines, all of these
+testsuites <a href="http://einsteintoolkit.org/release-info/parse_testsuite_results.php">pass</a>,
+using both MPI and OpenMP parallelisation.</p>
<p>The changes between this and the previous release include:</p>
<ul>
@@ -22,65 +61,71 @@
<ul>
<li> Significant internal development
<li> Grid structure is handled in a more efficient manner, leading to improved parallel scalability
- <li> Grid structure output now supports multipatch
+ <li> Grid structure output supports multipatch
<li> Improvements to OpenMP parallelism in Carpet
<li> Support for cell-centering
- <li> Timers are now hierarchical - use parameter output_timer_tree_every to output the timer tree to standard output. This makes it much easier to see where the time is spent in a simulation
- <li> A backtrace file is now written to the output directory when the simulation code crashes. Note that you probably need to add the -rdynamic option to CFLAGS and CXXFLAGS for the backtrace symbols to be interpreted correctly.
+ <li> Timers are hierarchical, which makes it much easier to see where the time is spent in a simulation. (Use the parameter output_timer_tree_every to output the timer tree to standard output.)
+ <li> A backtrace file is written to the output directory when the simulation code crashes. (Note that you probably need to add the -rdynamic option to CFLAGS and CXXFLAGS for the backtrace symbols to be interpreted correctly.)
</ul>
- <li> CarpetIOHDF5: There are now parameters which select whether symmetry, boundary and buffer points are output for sliced output.
- <li> CarpetRegrid2: Now supports "true" AMR based on a regridding criterion
+ <li> CarpetIOHDF5: There are now parameters to select whether
+ symmetry, boundary, or buffer points should be output.
+ <li> CarpetRegrid2: Supports full AMR based on a regridding criterion
<li> SimFactory
<ul>
- <li> Completely new rewrite, new repository.
- <li> Machine database and optionlists updated due to system changes on HPC resources
- <li> Can now run the Cactus test suites as part of a job in a queuing system
- <li> TODO: List of new machines supported by SimFactory?
- <li> Optionlists now enable instruction vectorisation by default - this affects those thorns that explicitly use this vectorisation, including McLachlan and Carpet
- <li> Now supports parameter file scripts <name>.rpar - these should be scripts which write a parameter file to <name>.par. This is useful for performing simple calculations on parameters in python or perl
- <li> Now uses the Intel compiler by default on Kraken and Hopper
+ <li> Internally completely rewritten
+ <li> Machine database and optionlists updated
+ <li> Can run the Cactus test suites as part of a job in a queuing system
+ <!-- <li> TODO: List of new machines supported by SimFactory? -->
+ <li> Optionlists enable instruction vectorization by default,
+ which can significantly improve performance. (This affects those thorns that explicitly use vectorisation, including McLachlan and Carpet.)
+ <li> Supports parameter file scripts <name>.rpar, written e.g.
+ in Perl or Python.
+ <li> Uses the Intel compiler by default on Kraken and Hopper
</ul>
<li> Cactus
<ul>
<li> CUDA support added for GPU computing
- <li> Parameters can now be used in STORAGE specifications in schedule.ccl files
- <li> Multi-line parameter values can now contain comments - this makes it easier to comment out entries
- <li> Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) is now supported
- <li> CCTK_GFINDEX3D now checks index against array bounds when CCTK_DEBUG is defined
- <li> Standard output of Cactus build process is now much more compact
+ <li> Parameters can be used in STORAGE specifications in schedule.ccl files
+ <li> Multi-line parameter values can contain comments - this makes it easier to comment out entries
+ <li> Mac OS 10.7 (Lion) is supported
+ <li> CCTK_GFINDEX3D checks index against array bounds in debug configurations
+ <li> Standard output of Cactus build process is much more compact
</ul>
<li> McLachlan
<ul>
- <li> Performance improvements
+ <li> Various performance improvements
<li> BSSN has instruction vectorisation enabled by default for improved speed
</ul>
<li> GRHydro
<ul>
- <li> Support for MHD was added, but is by default disabled.
+ <li> Supports GR-MHD
</ul>
- <li> WeylScal4: OpenMP support enabled in WeylScal4
- <li> TimerReport: "top timers" now given as min/max/mean across all processes instead of just from the root process
+ <li> WeylScal4: parallelised via OpenMP
+ <li> TimerReport: "top timers" given as min/max/mean across all processes (instead of just from the root process)
<li> ADMBase
<ul>
- <li> Variables now have flat boundary condition applied
- <li> Default value of ADMBase::initial_shift is now zero rather than none
+ <li> ADM variables have flat boundary condition applied
+ <li> Shift vector has storage by default
</ul>
- <li> TwoPunctures: Now outputs a BBH metadata file, as used by NINJA / NRAR projects
- <li> Vectors: New thorn which supports instruction vectorization to improve performance of codes that use it
- <li> Cauchy Characteristic Extraction and the PITT Null Code are now included.
+ <li> TwoPunctures: Outputs a BBH metadata file, as used by NINJA / NRAR projects
+ <li> Vectors: New thorn for vectorizing code, can significantly
+ improve performance of codes that use it
+ <li> Cauchy Characteristic Extraction and the PITT Null Code are included.
<ul>
<li> The Pitt code implements a robust fully nonlinear characteristic evolution scheme for the Einstein equations for asymptotically flat spacetimes.
<li> Included in the code is the gauge invariant calculation of the Bondi News function at future null infinity.
- <li> Include in the code are thorns that implement Cauchy Characteristic extraction, where Cauchy evolutions (McLachlan) provide boundary data for a characteristic evolution. This allows for the unambiguous calculation of the gravitational waveform from merging BBH spacetimes.
+ <li> Included in the code are thorns that implement Cauchy Characteristic extraction, where Cauchy evolutions (McLachlan) provide boundary data for a characteristic evolution. This allows for the unambiguous calculation of the gravitational waveform from merging BBH spacetimes.
</ul>
<li> FFTW3 library has been added to the ET
<li> Kranc
<ul>
- <li> thorns can now be generated including a Jacobian transformation of all derivatives - this means they can be used with multi-patch
- <li> improvements to instruction vectorization
- <li> can now perform finite differences using either function calls or macros; control using VECTORISE_INLINE = yes/no in optionlist; using functions can make the code fit in the instruction cache where it didn't before, resulting in large speed increases, using macros can cause compilers to run out of memory for complicated codes
- <li> Generated thorns now check that there are sufficient ghost and boundary points for the finite differencing stencil used
- <li> error detection has been improved
+ <li>Thorns can be generated including a Jacobian transformation of
+ all derivatives - this means they can be used with multi-patch grids
+ <li> Improvements to instruction vectorization
+ <li> Reduced instruction cache usage, selected via VECTORISE_INLINE
+ = yes/no in the optionlist. This can result in large speed increases.
+ <li> Generated thorns check that there are sufficient ghost and boundary points for the finite differencing stencils
+ <li> Improved error detection
</ul>
</ul>
</p>
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