Configuration tool

The configuration tool is a graphical interface to the registry settings that control some of runtime configurable options to mpich.

In order to run an application on various hosts without specifying the hosts in a configuration file, the launcher needs to know all the hosts it has been installed on. MPIConfig.exe can find the hosts where the launcher has been installed and write this list of hosts to the registry. With this information mpirun can pick hosts from the list in the registry when determining where to launch processes.

A shortcut to the configuration tool is found here:
start->programs->MPICH->mpd->MPICH Configuration tool.
See Figure 2 for a snapshot of the tool.

Create the host list

Section 1 of the dialog has a list that needs to be filled with the hostnames where mpd has been installed. Use the buttons and/or type host names directly into the edit box to create the list.

Add button: Adds the host name from the edit box to the list

Select button: Bring up a dialog to select host names from the network.

Select the options to configure

Section 2 of the dialog contains the list of options that can be configured.

If you check the hosts box, mpiconfig makes a group out of all the selected hosts and writes this list of host names to the registry on each host. When mpirun is executed with the -np option from any host in a group, hosts will be selected from the list in round robin fashion.

The launch timeout specifies how long MPIRun will wait before it determines that it is unable to launch a process. The time is in seconds.

Specify a job host if you want mpirun to send job information to an mpd running on the specified host. With this enabled, you can use the MPIJob tools to view where jobs are running, what state they are in, and you can kill errant jobs. Since the job database is stored in the mpd running on the specified host, the host you input here must have an mpd installed and running on it.

The rank based colored output checkbox enables/disables colorized output. There are 32 colors that are given out to the ranks in round robin fashion.

The logon dots check is for mpirun to display .... while decrypting passwords. It is essentially a progress indicator to tell the user that mpirun has not hung.

The mimic local drive mapping is for when mpirun is executed from a network mapped drive. With this option enabled, mpirun tries to make the same mapping on the remote hosts where it launches processes. For example you might have the Z: drive mapped to myserver myhome. If you execute mpirun from the Z: directory, mpirun will attempt to map Z: to myserver myhome on the remote machines before launching processes.

The 'display system dialog ...' check only applies to jobs run on a single machine with the -localonly option to mpirun. Disable this option to prevent the system from showing dialog boxes when processes crash. This is useful if you have a script running jobs and you don't want it to hang waiting for an error dialog box to be closed.

The 'catch unhandled exceptions' option causes mpd to watch each process as it is running and report if an unhandled exception has caused a process to exit. Normally, processes simply exit when an unhandled exception occurs.

The 'mpirun prints the exitcodes' option causes mpirun to print the exit code of each process as it exits. Lines like:

[rank 2 exit code: 0] 

will be inserted in the standard output of mpirun.

The 'redirect mpd output to log' causes mpd to redirect all of its internal output messages to the log file specified. The log file must reside on the local hard drive. This file can get large quickly if you run a lot of jobs.

The 'enable -localroot option by default' causes mpirun to use the localroot option if it is not specified on the command line. The localroot option causes the root process to be launched by mpirun instead of mpd if mpirun is on the same node as the root. This allows the root process to bring up visible windows. The disadvantage of the option is that the root process cannot use shared memory to reach the rest of the processes on the same node and it reverts to sockets.

Apply the settings

Apply button:

All the hosts are contacted and the selected settings are set.

Apply single:

The selected host from the host list is contacted and the selected settings are set. This option would be useful to set an option on a single node without affecting the settings on the rest of the nodes.

Password

If you installed mpd manually and set the passphrase to something other than the default, enter it here.

Show host configuration:

Check this box to show the configuration of the currently selected host.

Modify:

You can change individual options on the currently selected host by checking the option you want to change and then hit the modify button.