Platform Computing Introduces Comprehensive Monitoring and Analysis Tools for Platform LSF Environments
Platform RTM 8 and Platform Analytics 8 Designed to Monitor, Manage and Analyze Cluster Usage for Improved Productivity and Resource Utilization
TORONTO, May 3, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- Platform Computing, the leader in cluster, grid and cloud management software, today announced the latest versions of two tools designed to help HPC administrators and IT managers monitor and report on high performance computing workloads as well as analyze the associated data. Both tools help optimize decisions that lead toward more effective operations of their HPC datacenter. Platform RTM 8 is a comprehensive operational dashboard that provides administrators with the information and tools needed to maximize cluster efficiency, enable better user productivity and contain or reduce costs. Geared toward IT managers, planners and administrators, Platform Analytics 8 is an advanced analysis and visualization tool that provides the insight needed to quickly identify and troubleshoot bottlenecks and analyze usage trends within the HPC datacenter so that administrators can improve capacity planning and optimize HPC resource utilization, leading to reduced costs. Both products are designed to complement the Platform LSF product family.
Platform RTM provides the most comprehensive workload monitoring and reporting available for Platform LSF environments. It offers easy and effective monitoring of all workload scheduling and license usage facets through a single interface, allowing administrators to quickly resolve issues without service interruptions. A flexible, automated alert system also flags issues quickly to keep cluster resources up and running as needed. With its broad set of capabilities, Platform RTM can replace multiple tools in typical Platform LSF environments with a single easy-to-use, monitoring tool. This results in improved productivity for administrators and users alike, as well as reduced cost and complexity.
A tool for analyzing, correlating and visualizing large amounts of Platform LSF workload data, Platform Analytics enables data-driven decision making based on job, resource and license data collected from one or more Platform LSF clusters. The tool includes an innovative interface that is built on top of a powerful analytics engine, providing fast and easy results. Users can choose from a variety of pre-configured dashboards or choose to build their own for obtaining quick answers about the status of their HPC infrastructure and applications for optimal resource planning and utilization.
Quotes
-- "The ability to monitor cluster availability and performance is
imperative when we're running millions of design simulations to test our
latest software releases," said Steve MacQuiddy, IT Director Engineering
Infrastructure, Cadence Design Systems. "Having the single Platform RTM
dashboard allows us to simultaneously observe the entire cluster
environment and it has not only made it easier for us to better balance
our workloads, but it's also helped us optimize throughput for our
critical jobs during peak usage."
-- "Keeping our HPC datacenter online is critical for us when we're running
frequent tests of designs for our race cars. Even slight design tweaks
need to be tested scrupulously before we can put the design into
production for the race track," said Matt Cadieux, IT Director, Red Bull
Racing. "Platform Analytics allows us to both track our cluster usage,
as well as identify any potential problems that might interfere with
running design tests. It also allows the design team to plan peak usage
around heavy test times so that the design process runs smoothly every
time."
-- "Platform RTM 8 is built on the powerful and extensible open-source
Cacti graphing framework and offers some powerful new features like grid
alarms, which allow us to quickly build alerts without resorting to
Cacti graphs," said Kevin Rota, CIO, Simulia, Dassault Systemes. "RTM
has allowed Simulia to easily access and visualize extensive amounts of
data providing much better insight into how our LSF resources are being
used and by whom. These new features will provide improvements in
quality of service."
-- "Cluster administrators need to be able to monitor and analyze their
cluster performance in order to troubleshoot potential issues and
analyze usage patterns for better efficiency and use across their
Platform LSF infrastructures," said Louise Westoby, Senior Product
Marketing Manager, Platform Computing. "With IT staff strapped for time
these days, building homegrown monitoring, reporting and alerting
systems is not a viable option. Platform RTM and Platform Analytics
offers the full visibility users need to get the most out of their
Platform LSF clusters, queues and jobs so administrators and users can
maintain productivity and contain costs."
Platform RTM 8 Features
Unlike tools that only monitor infrastructure at a basic level, Platform RTM includes workload and resource-aware monitoring across all workload facets, including global clusters, hosts, licenses queues, users and log files. New features include:
-- Single-view, intuitive dashboard - provides quick identification of
problems via visible status indicators
-- Multi-cluster support - improves efficiency by providing way to manage
tasks remotely for increased time savings
-- Resource consumption monitoring - analyzes scheduling policies based on
reported resource utilization
-- Resource monitoring by user, group or team - ensures resource use is
aligned to business priorities and aids in capacity planning through
multi-level allocation monitoring
-- Automated alerts and exception handling - improves cluster availability
with timely notifications and reduces administrator workload through
multiple metric triggers
Platform Analytics 8 Features
Platform Analytics uses an innovative visualization tool to translate raw business data into usable information quickly and easily. Key features include:
-- Powerful, graphical interface - provides a comprehensive, easily
modifiable view to quickly answer workload usage questions
-- Dashboard view - choose from pre-configured or customized views that
incorporate existing data sources without the need for programming
-- Multi-level analysis - allows analysis at the job, resource and service
levels for increased efficiency and productivity and for identifying
usage trends and chargeback needs
-- Open architecture - easily integrates HPC datacenter and job-related
data with external data sources
-- High performance - dynamically scales to accommodate thousands of users
and millions of jobs including access to long-range historical data for
more thorough and complete analyses
Resources
Platform RTM 8 is available now and Platform Analytics 8 is available May 17.
Platform Computing is the leader in cluster, grid and cloud management software -- serving more than 2,000 of the world's most demanding organizations. For 18 years, our workload and resource management solutions have delivered IT responsiveness and lower costs for enterprise and HPC applications. Platform has strategic relationships with Cray, Dell, Fujitsu, HP, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, Red Hat, and SAS. Visit http://www.platform.com.
SOURCE Platform Computing
Platform Computing
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