AutoSIM

Abstract

AutoSIM enables several instances of an executable to run in parallel on a directory of input files and consolidate results, at scale on the world's fastest supercomputers. The software accomplishes this by balancing compression, transmission, and computation of input files, executables, and output files to allow scalable parallel runs of any executable. The software breaks-up simulations into a configurable number of "churns" or sequential instances of executable invocations on a configurable number of cores/node. It sends the executable, supporting files, and appropriate number of input files to each node for independent execution, and then transfers the executable results to a shared disk for post-processing analysis. This MPI-based code has been demonstrated using EnergyPlus, DOE's flagship whole-building simulation engine, but was architected to allow scalable runtime of any software for any application (e.g. sensitivity analysis and uncertainty quantification). The code has also been demonstrated to scale on the Titan supercomputer using 131,072 processors to run 524,288 EnergyPlus annual simulations, and write 45TB of data to disk in 68 mins 08 secs.