Conference call notes 20190206

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Notes on the 119th EasyBuild conference call, Wednesday Feb 6th 2019 (17:00 - 18:00 CET)

Attendees

Alphabetical list of attendees (XXX):

• Damian Alvarez (JSC, Germany)
• Fotis Georgatos (SDSC, Switzerland)
• Victor Holanda (CSCS, Switzerland)
• Kenneth Hoste (HPC-UGent, Belgium)
• Adam Huffman (Big Data Institute, UK)
• Alan O'Cais (JSC, Germany)
• Mikael Öhman (Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden)
• Bart Oldeman (ComputeCanada)
• Davide Vanzo (Vanderbilt University, US)

Agenda

• report on 4th EasyBuild User Meeting
• follow-up on moving Python to GCCcore
• standard (container-based) testing environment
• Q&A

Report on 4th EasyBuild User Meeting

• commonly requested features

  • support for uninstalling
  • Python 3 support
  • better logging/error reporting
    • Spack approach makes sense: use CMake regex patterns for "zooming in" on errors/warnings in logs
    • should also pick up config.log and include it in EasyBuild log?

• integration with ReFrame

• Spack talk

• query about progress with .yeb easyconfigs (YAML syntax)

Follow-up on moving Python to GCCcore

• cfr. https://github.com/easybuilders/easybuild-easyconfigs/issues/7463

Standard (container-based) testing environment

• Singularity image(s)?
  • starting point: https://github.com/boegel/sandbox/tree/master/easybuild-testing
  • clear MOTD to explain usage + pointer to dedicated docs
• OS:
  • CentOS 7.x (cfr. EUM survey)
  • OpenHPC based?
  • more later?
• arch: only x86_64 initially
  • can also consider POWER (via Micael's boxes and/or QEMU) and ARM (QEMU)
• EasyBuild installation
  • inside or outside container?
  • latest release vs current develop (there are use cases for both)
• minimal vs fat installation
  • both are needed for good test "coverage" (cfr. problems with Boost system installation)
  • slightly less minimal environment needed to build GCCcore, can be stripped down later (no g++, etc.)
• software/modules installation prefix outside of container
  • standard setup, e.g.:
    • /apps installation prefix which can be bind-mounted into container?
    • build dir in /tmp (or optionally /dev/shm)

Other

• (Kenneth) intel/2019 vs Intel 2019 update 2 releases
  • ship has sailed?