Building a High-performance Computing Cluster Using FreeBSD

Brooks Davis, Michael AuYeung, Gary Green, Craig Lee
The Aerospace Corporation
El Segundo, CA
{brooks,lee,mauyeung} at aero.org, Gary.B.Green at notes.aero.org

Abstract

In this paper we discuss the design and implementation of Fellowship, a 300+ CPU, general use computing cluster based on FreeBSD. We address the design features including configuration management, network booting of nodes, and scheduling which make this cluster unique and how FreeBSD helped (and hindered) our efforts to make this design a reality.

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