The ctrl_pool framework builds a batch submission system around our existing tasks. It provides a series of arguments which can be used to control the resources allocated to each task. For example:

$ constructBias.py  --help

[...]

Batch submission options:

  --queue QUEUE         Queue name

  --job JOB             Job name

  --nodes NODES         Number of nodes

  --procs PROCS         Number of processors per node

  --cores CORES         Number of cores (Slurm/SMP only)

  --time TIME           Expected execution time per element (sec)

However, the wrapped task also has some similar sounding arguments. Following on from the above, we have:

*** Wrapped script:

usage: constructBias.py input [options]

[...]

optional arguments:

[...]

  -j PROCESSES, --processes PROCESSES

                        Number of processes to use

  -t TIMEOUT, --timeout TIMEOUT

                        Timeout for multiprocessing; maximum wall time (sec)

I can speculate about how these options interact (I guess that -j1 --procs 2 means run two tasks at a time and give each access to one CPU core, while -j2 --procs 1 means one task a time a time but let it use two cores), but I don't know, and I don't think I can unambiguously derive it from the documentation. Similar issues arise for timeouts, etc.

Please provide some instructions on how this is actually supposed to fit together so we can avoid confusion in the future (see e.g. DM-9415 for what happens when somebody encounters the current system for the first time).