[Beowulf] Gentoo in the HPC environment

[Gavin W. Burris]

On Thu 06/26/14 10:43AM -0400, Prentice Bisbal wrote:
> I think you're missing Ellis' point about serving the needs of the users,
> but you do make a valid point, that is a constant source of pain for system
> admins in general, not just HPC - we often can't justify hours (more like
> days or weeks) of work to support a feature that benefit one user for a
> short period of time, especially if that work takes us away from working on
> things that will benefit many other users in the long run.
> 
> Yes, this is a very simplified argument, and there's a lot of factors that
> go into proper cost-benefit analysis, but it's common for a researcher to
> ask us admins to devote an inordinate amount of time for a request that will
> benefit some pet issue of theirs, but not provide ANY value to any other
> user or the organization. Again - this is a simplified argument and
> statement - don't flame me. I don't want to go too far off-topic on this
> thread.

Agreed, Prentice.  This is a line we all walk.  If I can do something in
15 minutes, I'll just do it.  If it is going to require a significant
amount of staff time, we have to have a sit-down meeting to discuss a
formal project, including budget.  This typically weeds out the pet
issues or wishlist items, and let's the important things get done.

Cheers,
-- 
Gavin W. Burris
Senior Project Leader for Research Computing
The Wharton School
University of Pennsylvania