Building VisIt on JUQUEEN

In addition to the normal build_visit script, a special build script for JUQUEEN, called build_visit_BGQ, ist needed. To build VisIt one has to execute this script. build_visit_BGQ in turn calls the build_visit script with a special set of parameters to generate a static version of the libsim and other components which are necessary for a static linking to your simulation code.

1) download scripts

Before one can execute the build_visit_BGQ (and thereby build_visit) script, a couple of helper-scripts are also needed. These helper-scripts are contained in the svn_bin/bv_support folder of the visit source-tree. The two original build scripts and the bv_support folder can be downloaded as follows (for VisIt version 2.9.2):

Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

2) patch scripts

As of Version 2.9.2 the original build_visit_BQG and build_visit scripts where not able to compile VisIt on the JUQUEEN installation at JSC correctly. We had to make changes to the scripts, e.g. build_visit_BGQ was not able to handle multiple compiler arguments and the build_visit script generated a wrong host-configuration file.
For VisIt 2.9.2 we could fix these issues and now have a corrected version of the script build_visit_BGQ which should be used on the JUQUEEN at JSC:

patch build_visit_BGQ

compare build_visit_BGQ with the following one and apply changes
(changes have been reported as ​bugreport)

• build_visit_BGQ

patch build_visit

In bv_support/helper_funcs.sh you will find a section with the following code
(if you have downloaded the build_visit including all functions of bv_support it is in build_visit directly)

Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

Here the paths for MPI are set. You might have to change them. Make sure they point to the correct directories.
For the current (15.10.2015) setup on JUQUEEN mpi.h can only be found if the paths include "${BLUEGENEQ}/spi/include".

3) add extras

If you want visit to build additional I/O packages, e.g. boost, netcdf, hdf5, ..., needed by several VisIt-readers (databases), you have to edit line 39 in the build_visit_BGQ script, e.g.

Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

If you omit this line, visit tries to find system wide installations of the packages. But be aware that, in this case, several databases maybe cannot be build if the corresponding packages are not found.

4) compile VisIt

The build_visit_BGQ script may be invoked e.g. with the following arguments:

Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

The build sequence is as follows:

• first, the compute-node version of VisIt is build in the directory builds_static_BGQ,
• than the login-node version is build in the directory builds_static

In the build process the following third party packages are installed in the directory thirdparty_static:

• mesa
• zlib, szip
• cmake
• python (including python image library (PIL), pyparsing, seedme-python)
• vtk
• icet
• I/O-Libs: boost, hdf5, netcdf, silo

5) install VisIt

install VisIt for the login node (linux-ppc64)

• create a tar.gz file for the login node
  Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

  No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

• install VisIt for the login node from that tar.gz package
  (all symlinks in libraries will be reset to the paths of the machine !!)
  Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

  No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

  • eg. svn_bin/visit-install 2.9.2 linux-ppc64 /home/VisIt/2.9.2/release/linux-ppc64

install VisIt for the compute node

After the build process has successfully finished, VisIt is installed in the directory linux-ppc64-BGQ. It is convenient to copy all necessary libs for the compute-node into one directory. This way all libs your application needs for linking are in one common directory (linux-ppc64-BGQ/2.9.2/linux-ppc64/libsim/V2/libBGQ/, which also already contains the libsimV2 and libsimV2f).

• copy require libs to libBGQ path:
  Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

  No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

• VisIt for BlueGene/Q is now installed in linux-ppc64-BGQ - just copy it to the destination path:
  Error: Failed to load processor ShellExample

  No macro or processor named 'ShellExample' found

  • eg. cp -a linux-ppc64-BGQ /home/VisIt/2.9.2/release/

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any feedback welcomed - h.zilken@…, goebbert@…