Windows Azure and HPC

Scenarios and workload Overview

Problem StatementTo meet its statutory obligations for daily processing of space and terrestrial radio service notices and to solve complex problems, ITU has a need to perform CPU intensive calculations in a limited timeframe.Thus, as a component of IT system, ITU have developed a local distributed infrastructure which is currently used to manage the workload of calculations-on-demand submitted by our Membership. Such a workload is greatly time-dependent and is based on the pull model, with a database acting as the master and a number of Windows services as the slaves.

ITU Cloud Architecture

Bandwidth charges Europe + North America Other locations 100 GB $12.00 $19.00

Storage Geo Redundant(with second sub region storage)

Locally redundant(with single sub region)

1000 GB $125 $93 Transaction Geo Redundant(with second

sub region storage) Locally redundant(with single sub region)

10 Million $1 $1

The Windows Azure Platform

Windows Azure Platform

Developer ExperienceUse existing skills and tools.

“Operating system in the

cloud”

Compute Storage Management Relational data

MarketplaceApp FabricCDN Management

“Middlewarein the cloud” “Relational

databasein the cloud”

Microsoft HPC Scenarios overview

On-premise

Desktop User

HPC Head Node

Broker Node(s)

HPC Cluster

Desktop Compute Cloud via Idle Win 7 Workstation Cores

Azure Compute Instances

Azure Compute Proxies

Microsoft components for HPC

HPC Editio

n

Head Node

WCF Broker Nodes

4. Requests

6. Responses

Compute Nodes

Workstation

5. Responses

3. Requests

2. HN provides WCF Broker node

to Client and Session Manager

assigns WCF Broker node for

Client job

1. Create Session

SOA on an HPC Cluster

AzureCN1…….AzureCNx

On PremiseWindows HPC Server 2008 R2 +SOA scheduler

Dedicated nodes – HPC Servers 2008 R2Cycle scavenging – Windows 7 desktops

Solution

Burst in AzureWindows HPC Server 2008 R2 Azures Nodes

Extend the on-premise cluster to the cloud, absorb peak demand, keep windows HPC applications performing without change.

Solution

With your Azure subscription add additional resources when you need themPay only when you use them

Applications in Azure

Multiple business models• Application usage is

licensed to customers

• Application and compute is provided as a service in the cloud

Scheduler and Runtimes Supported in Azure• Embedded Azure

Scheduler, not a Head Node

• All runtimes: Parametric Sweep, MPI, Cluster SOA, Excel

Solution Application in hosted entirely in Azure

• No on-premise Head Node

Application is accessed from• Rich client on premise• Web Application or portal• Web Service

Timescale compression

Buy a server

1

100

1 1001 server 100 weeks

100 servers 1 week*£8k

$8k

Examples of Azure HPC Workloads Finance (CM+ Insurance)

Risk/Analytics ESG/ALM

Media Encode/Transcode Analytics

Life science Genomics Cell profiling

Engineering/Universities Some optimisation simulations

Spreadsheet

Head Node

Brokers

Request Sessio

n

Broker

Assignment

Job SubmissionTask

Assignment

Resul

tsResults

Excel Workbooks on the Cluster

Thank you..

Questions ??