There are 2 kinds of system admins: can do and can't do. You're a can do; his are can't do.
On 3/21/19 10:26 AM, Prentice Bisbal wrote: > > On 3/20/19 1:58 PM, Christopher Samuel wrote: >> On 3/20/19 4:20 AM, Frava wrote: >> >>> Hi Chris, thank you for the reply. >>> The team that manages that cluster is not very fond of upgrading >>> SLURM, which I understand. > > As a system admin who manages clusters myself, I don't understand this. > Our job is to provide and maintain resources for our users. Part of that > maintenance is to provide updates for security, performance, and > functionality (new features) reasons. HPC has always been a leading-edge > kind if field, so I feel this is even more important for HPC admins. > > Yes, there can be issues caused by updates, but those can be with proper > planning: Have a plan to do the actual upgrade, have a plan to test for > issues, and have a plan to revert to an earlier version if issues are > discovered. This is work, but it's really not all that much work, and > this is exactly the work we are being paid to do as cluster admins. > > From my own experience, I find *not* updating in a timely manner is > actually more problematic and more work than keep on top of updates. For > example, where I work now, we still haven't upgraded to CentOS 7, and as > a result, many basic libraries are older than what many of the > open-source apps my users need require. As a result, I don't just have > to install application X, I often have to install up-to-date versions of > basic libraries like libreadline, libcurses, zlib, etc. And then there > are the security concerns... > > Okay, rant over. I'm sorry. It just bothers me when I hear fellow system > admins aren't "very fond" of things that I think are a core > responsbility of our jobs. I take a lot of pride on my job. > > -- > Prentice > >
