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Most important changes

  • The Pawsey Energy & Resources Merit Allocation Scheme has been discontinued. Researchers from the Australian energy and resources research community are encouraged to apply through the NCMAS and Pawsey Partner schemes.
  • In 2022 researchers applying through the NCMAS and Pawsey Partner Schemes will apply for allocations on Setonix Phase 1 (first Request) and Setonix Phase 2 (second Request) separately.
  • Applicants to Pawsey Partner Scheme will use a new submission form, which is available from the Pawsey Submission Portal.
  • Pawsey Partner Scheme Assessments Criteria has been updated

For technical details about changes in supercomputing services for 2022 visit: /wiki/spaces/US/pages/51925794

Pawsey Energy and Resources Merit Allocation Scheme

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NCMAS

Pawsey Partner Scheme

Pawsey Partner Scheme assessment criteria

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Table 1. Changes to assessment criteria from 2022

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Research (50%)

  • Project Quality and Innovation (research criteria, 30%)

  • Investigators (research criteria, 10%)

  • Benefit and Impact (research criteria, 10%)

Technical (50%)

  • Suitability (technical criteria, 15%)

  • Scalability (technical criteria, 10%)

  • Usage (technical criteria, 10%)

  • Appropriateness of Request (technical  criteria, 15%)

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Research (70%)

  • Project Quality and Innovation (research criteria, 30%)

  • Investigators (research criteria, 15%)

  • Appropriateness of Request (research criteria, 15%)

  • Benefit and Impact (research criteria, 10%)

Technical (30%)

  • Suitability (technical review, 15%)

  • Scalability (technical review, 15%)

Available core hours for 2022 allocations (Pawsey Supercomputing Centre)

The computational resources available to researchers through the Pawsey Partner and NCMAS schemes will increase substantially with the delivery of Setonix Phase 2 in the second half of 2022. In 2022 researchers applying through these schemes will apply separately for allocations on Setonix Phase 1 (first request) and Setonix Phase 2 (second request).

The applications will be open only for Setonix CPU partition allocations.

Resources available for first and second requests and minimum allocation sizes are presented in table 2.

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Table 2. Resources available for first and second requests

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First Request

full year

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Second Request

2H 2022 pro-rata

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Pawsey Partner Merit Allocation Scheme

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max. 190M Service Units

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  • From 2023 allocation round, submissions to NCMAS and Pawsey Partner Schemes can now include Setonix CPU and Setonix GPU requests.
  • Minimum allocation request size is now 1M Service Units.
  • Accounting model for Setonix now includes Service Units definition for both Setonix CPU and GPU partitions.    
  • There is no Pawsey Partner top-up allocations starting from 2023 allocation round. Researchers can apply to both NCMAS and Pawsey Partner Scheme subject to the eligibility and conditions of these schemes.
  • The new Preparatory Access Scheme is now available for researchers who need to port and benchmark their codes and workflows before applying to one of the merit allocation schemes.


Column


MilestonePawsey Partner SchemeNCMAS

Call Open

21st August 2023 - 3rd October 2023 (5pm AWST) extended to 9th October 2023 (5pm AWST)

21st August 2023 - 3rd October 2023 (5pm AWST)
Submissions Portalhttps://ssl.linklings.net/organizations/pawsey/https://my.nci.org.au/mancini/ncmas/2024/

Committee Meetings

7th December 2023

4-5 December 2023

Applicants Notified

22nd December 2023

18 December 2023


Available resources for 2024 allocations (Pawsey Supercomputing Centre)

Single application to National Computational Merit Allocation Scheme (NCMAS) and Pawsey Partner Merit Allocation Scheme schemes can now include Setonix-CPU and Setonix-GPU requests. Researchers can apply only for Setonix-CPU allocation, only for Setonix-GPU allocation or for both.

The minimum allocation request for National Computational Merit Allocation Scheme (NCMAS) and Pawsey Partner Merit Allocation Scheme is 1M Service Units.

Resources available in 2024 allocation round are presented in table 1.


Column


Table 1. Resources available on Setonix for the 2024 allocation round

Scheme

Request

full year

National Computational Merit Allocation Scheme

Scheme total capacity

485M Service Units Total:

  • 325M Service Units (core hours) on Setonix-CPU
  • 160M Service Units on Setonix-GPU
Minimum request size

1M Service Units

Pawsey Partner Merit Allocation SchemeScheme total capacity
100M

575M Service Units

max. 155M Service Units
Minimum request size250k Service Units1M Service Units

At the time of writing, the exact date of Setonix Phase 2 availability for researchers is not known. The maximum capacity in each scheme was calculated based on assumption that Setonix Phase 2 will become available from July 2022. The actual allocation sizes for secondary requests will be scaled pro-rata based on Setonix Phase 2 availability. Here are two example scenarios:

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Info
iconfalse
titleExample 1

Research group A applied for and was awarded 2M SUs on Setonix Phase 1 and 10M SUs on Setonix Phase 2.
Setonix Phase 2 became available for researchers on the first day of Q4 2022.

The real allocation of research group A is:

  • 2M SUs on Setonix Phase 1 available throughout the year,
  • 5M SUs on Setonix Phase 2 available in Q4 2022.
Info
iconfalse
titleExample 2

Research group B applied for and was awarded 1M SUs on Setonix Phase 1 and 5M SUs on Setonix Phase 2.
Setonix Phase 2 became available for researchers on the first day of 2H 2022.

The real allocation of research group B is:

  • 1M SUs on Setonix Phase 1 available throughout the year,
  • 5M SUs on Setonix Phase 2 available in 2H 2022.

There is no maximum limit to the amount of time that can be requested. However, partial allocations may be awarded depending on the availability and demand for allocations within the scheme.

Note that 250,000 core hours in a year is approximately the equivalent of two 16-core workstations. Applications for such small allocations must specify why access to a supercomputer is necessary for the research. Based on the scoring criteria below such uses of the supercomputer are unlikely to be competitive against other applications that demonstrate they need the expensive interconnect. Nimbus Documentation Landing Page is better suited to single-node applications and has a lightweight application process. The minimum allocation size is higher for the second Request and will increase to 2M SUs per year in 2023 when both CPU and GPU partitions of Setonix will be available for Merit Allocation Schemes.

Other non-Pawsey resources are available under the NCMAS, including NCI's Gadi supercomputer.

Timeline

13th - 17thDecember 2021
Column
MilestonePawsey Partner SchemeNCMAS

Calls Open

31st August 2021 - 11th October 2021 (5pm Anywhere on Earth Time)

18th August 2021 - 5th October 2021 (5pm AEDT)

Committee Meetings

 1-2-3 December 2021

Applicants Notified

22nd December 2021

 21st December 2021
  • 385M Service Units (core hours) on Setonix-CPU
  • 190M Service Units on Setonix-GPU
Minimum request size1M Service Units


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