HP Scalable Visualization Array Software - Manual (Page 20)

Thus, the SVA provides the HP Cluster Platform with a visualization component for those
applications that require visualization in addition to computation.
The following sections describe the components that make up an HP Cluster Platform, followed
by those tasks and components that are unique to an SVA.
2.2.1 Components of the HP Cluster Platform
Because the SVA is an extension of the HP Cluster Platform, you can begin by understanding its
base components without any visualization nodes. The following are the key architectural
components of an HP Cluster Platform system without visualization nodes:
Compute Nodes and
Administrative/Service Nodes
The compute cluster consists of compute nodes and
administrative or service nodes. Parallel applications are
allocated exclusive use of the compute nodes on which
they run. The other nodes provide administration, software
installation, remote login, file I/O, external network access,
and so on. These nodes are shared by multiple jobs, and
are not allocated to individual jobs. One such node is
designated as the head node, which is used for
administration and connects to the external network.
System Interconnect (SI) A high-bandwidth, low-latency network which connects
all nodes. This supports communication among the
compute nodes (for example, MPI and sockets) and file
I/O between compute nodes and a shared file system.
Administrative Network An Administrative Network connects all nodes in the
cluster. In an HP XC compute cluster, this consists of two
branches, the Administrative Network and the Console
Network. This private local Ethernet network runs TCP/IP.
The Administrative Network is Gigabit Ethernet (GigE);
the Console Network is 10/100 BaseT. (Because
visualization nodes do not support console functions,
visualization nodes are not connected to a console branch.)
Linux The nodes of the cluster run a derivative of 64-bit Red Hat®
Enterprise Linux Advanced Server.
Note:
All nodes must attach to two networks using different ports, one for the SI and one for the
Administrative Network.
2.2.2 Main Visualization Cluster Tasks
The SVA has a number of tasks that are unique to a visualization-capable cluster. It accomplishes
these tasks using a set of unique node types that differ in their hardware configurations, and so
are capable of different functional tasks. The main tasks are as follows:
Render images.
A node must have a graphics card to render images. A
visualization job uses multiple nodes to render image data
in parallel. A render node typically communicates over
the SI with other render and display nodes to composite
and display images.
Display images. The final output of a visualization application is a complete
displayed image that is the result of the parallel rendering
that takes place during an application job. To make this
possible, a display node must contain a graphics card
connected to a display device. The display can show images
integrated with the application user interface, or full screen
20 SVA Architecture