The close of the 2023 Winter Classic Invitational Student Cluster Competition is coming up fast, and I have to get some material out to you, our vast viewing audience, as quickly as possible, if not quicker. I’ve been traveling a lot recently, which has delayed my reporting on the event.

In this edition of the Studio Update Show, we reveal the results of the Oak Ridge Blast Challenge, which had students simulating the effects of a blast spreading through an image. In doing this, student learned how to use AthenaPK and how to manipulate meshes on the Frontier-like Ascend system at ORNL.

I’m joined in this show by cluster competition veteran Hai Ah Nam, whom you may recognize from her many appearances in my previous cluster competition videos, whether she was commentating or just cracking wise. We talk a little about her past contributions to the competitions, which is fun.

My regular broadcast partner, Addison Snell, was out on assignment introducing his new winter wear fashion line on the catwalk in Paris. (Check out 00:47 of the video to see more.)

In the video, Hai Ah and I go through the ORNL Blast Challenge, commenting on the difficulty and how this will prepare students for work in the HPC real world. And then we get to the results themselves with a look at “The Big Board.”

 

But wait, there’s more!

We also talked to the amazing Oak Ridge National Laboratory Blast Mentor Team (ORNL-BMT for short) and got a behind the scenes peek at the challenge they put together for the students. The ORNL-BMT did a fantastic job of selecting a meaty task for the students that would both build and test their HPC skills. The team really shone when it came to training; they provided a full slate of training materials on using Ascend and Athena, and they explained exactly what the students needed to do in a clear and concise way. Huge thanks to ORNL for setting up this module for the students – it is much appreciated by us and them.

Next up: NASA WRF Challenge results revealed, plus an interview with the NASA mentor team… stay tuned.

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