Large Scale Visualization on the Cray XT3 Using ParaView

"Large Scale Visualization on the Cray XT3 Using ParaView." Kenneth Moreland, David Rogers, John Greenfield, Berk Geveci, Patrick Marion, Alexander Neundorf, and Kent Eschenberg. In Cray User Group 2008.

Abstract

Post-processing and visualization are key components to understanding any simulation. Porting ParaView, a scalable visualization tool, to the Cray XT3 allows our analysts to leverage the same supercomputer they use for simulation to perform post-processing. Visualization tools traditionally rely on a variety of rendering, scripting, and networking resources; the challenge of running ParaView on the Lightweight Kernel is to provide and use the visualization and post-processing features in the absence of many OS resources. We have successfully accomplished this at Sandia National Laboratories and the Pittsburgh Supercomputing Center.

Full Paper

Large Scale Visualization on the Cray XT3 Using ParaView

Supplemental Materials

Follow Up Timings

As the deadline to the paper approached, we were still running performance measurements on Pittsburgh Supercomputer Center's Bigben Cray XT3 computer. We did not have time to put them in the paper, but here is summary of some metrics taken directly from the functional units that ran during the visualization. All measurements are given in seconds.

Component Job Size (processes)
128 256 512
Read 127.8 93.8 97.7
Cut 5.66 2.84 1.45
Render 1.57 0.85 0.49

 

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