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consider remove/rework provider tasks_per_node options #3617

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benclifford opened this issue Sep 14, 2024 · 0 comments
Open

consider remove/rework provider tasks_per_node options #3617

benclifford opened this issue Sep 14, 2024 · 0 comments

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@benclifford
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this parameter has been hard-coded at 1 since the end of the IPyParallel executor:

all subsequent executors have wanted a single process per node, managing their "tasks per node" count separately (for example, in htex through max_workers_per_node and in Work Queue through per-task resource allocation)

separately, the number of core slots to request on a node is usually ignored because most people run on a whole node at once: see slurm's exclusive parameter to cause this to be an irrelevant value (but not PBS -- #3616)

and the hard-coded 1 is interpreted by the launcher layer to mean launch a single worker process per node.

The historical context is that IPyParallelExecutor wanted the launcher layer to launch one copy of its worker running per-core.

it doesn't make sense in the modern one-worker-per-node scenario to be coupling the provider layer "allocate slots" use of this value with the launcher layer "run this many copies" behaviour.

Periodically I encounter users trying to adjust this in the source code for one reason or another and this coupling of launcher and provider gets in the way: #3616, for example, is about allocating many ranks on a node for a batch job but still only running one copy of the worker.

I propose that the interface looks like:

  • remove provider layer tasks_per_node parameter to tasks per node
  • add a parameter to relevant providers to set the tasks_per_node in job requests. This sits well alongside slurm's exclusive parameter as a "this is how much node I want" value.
  • make launchers only launch 1 task per node. the possibility exists for launching more than 1 task per node and that value could be preserved but it is increasingly like unused cruft.

Comments and questions welcome

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