HPC-04: Submit jobs to a discounted job queue where they might be interrupted

Executive Summary:

A researcher wants to consume more resources than they have been allocated and is willing to run at a discounted rate and a lower quality of service to have access to additional computing resources. The researcher may be running out of allocated resources, or may know up front that they need more resources than they have access to, and are therefore willing to use a lower quality of service, which includes the possibility of job interruption, in order to be charged a discounted rate.

User Importance Summary:

Researchers often find they have under-estimated the amount of computing needed for their projects and need options for obtaining access to more resources. Supplemental allocations are the typical solution. This use case is an alternate solution that is made possible by a completely separate need: time-critical compute services (see DA-06). On systems that offer time-critical compute services, there is often a job queue where "normal" jobs may be interrupted in order to satisfy time-critical jobs. The incentive to encourage "normal" jobs to be submitted is a discounted rate, thus presenting another option for researchers who need to "stretch" their allocated resources.

Target Communities and Sizes:

Researchers - 1,000 < N < 10,000 Educators - 100 < N < 1,000 Students - 1,000 < N < 10,000

Documents:

Full description (drafting version)
Capability delivery plan

Status:

User Review

Use Case Author:

John-Paul Navarro

Use Case Originators:

John-Paul Navarro

Use Case End User:

researchers