Hi, joe lerch wrote:

My son and three of his classmates got the assignment to put together a Beowolf cluster as a class project...

Is it better to try to postpone the assignment until we get SuSE 6.0 or better to just use 5.3? A deeper question : is SuSE better than RedHat for Beowolf?

I think that you can start with 5.3 since it becomes with the parallel (PVM) libraries from the Extreme Linux project. This is basically what you need to run a demonstration program. However it seems that the Beowulf community is using more and more Linux 2.2 so later, if you want to use specific Beowulf software, you would probably need SuSE 6.0 sooner or later. www.beowulf.org states that all their software is available for RedHat 5.2.

How about this question: Providing they get it set up and running, what software is available to show it working?

That's the question that should be answered _before_ they start to build the cluster :) It would be a good idea of they read the excellent HOW-TO for Beowulf written by Jacek Radajewski and Douglas Eadline in <A HREF="http://www.sci.usq.edu.au/staff/jacek/beowulf/HOWTO/"><A HREF="http://www.sci.usq.edu.au/staff/jacek/beowulf/HOWTO/</A">http://www.sci.usq.edu.au/staff/jacek/beowulf/HOWTO/</A</A>> They would learn that a Beowulf cluster should be designed to resolve a specific problem. There is no such thing as a general purpose parallel computer. So look for an application first; that can be tested with PVM using two ordinary Linux boxes, without constructing any Beowulf machine at all... Let us know about the whereabouts of SuSE 6.0 and Beowulf. Bye, Petri -- Petri Makijarvi - European Synchrotron Radiation Facility <A HREF="mailto:petri@esrf.fr">mailto:petri@esrf.fr</A> (HTML OK) <A HREF="http://www.esrf.fr/computing/cs/sysadmin/rtk/"><A HREF="http://www.esrf.fr/computing/cs/sysadmin/rtk/</A">http://www.esrf.fr/computing/cs/sysadmin/rtk/</A</A>> tel: +33-(0)4.76.88.22.50 fax: +33-(0)4.76.88.20.20 E.S.R.F. B.P 220 F-38043 Grenoble Cedex France - To get out of this list, please send email to majordomo@suse.com with this text in its body: unsubscribe suse-linux-e Check out the SuSE-FAQ at <A HREF="http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/"><A HREF="http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/</A">http://www.suse.com/Support/Doku/FAQ/</A</A>> and the archive at <A HREF="http://www.suse.com/Mailinglists/suse-linux-e/index.html"><A HREF="http://www.suse.com/Mailinglists/suse-linux-e/index.html</A">http://www.suse.com/Mailinglists/suse-linux-e/index.html</A</A>>