Facility Policies

Account Sponsorship and Retention Policies

This page is designed to help you understand the different account types you'll encounter in ALCF. It covers your responsibility as an account holder, an account sponsor, or a foreign national.

ALCF Acknowledgment Policy

This research used resources of the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility at Argonne National Laboratory, which is supported by the Office of Science of the U.S. Department of Energy under contract DE-AC02-06CH11357.

Data Policy

The Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF) network is an open research network. We cannot guarantee complete security for any data that resides on any of the ALCF resources. It is up to the users to provide the security that they need and to understand that ALCF resources and networks are open to many users and cannot be protected at a partitioned level.

Job Scheduling Policy

We ask that all users follow these guidelines:

  1. Follow good etiquette.
  2. Clearly, some work will require use of the machine beyond these bounds. Please send email to support at alcf.anl.gov so that we can make arrangements to accommodate you.
  3. If we get well-founded complaints from other users of the system about your jobs, we will attempt to contact you to determine the best course of action. However, under some circumstances, we may have to kill running jobs.

Pullback Policy

In an effort to ensure our valuable computing resources are used judiciously, Argonne has instituted a pullback policy. INCITE and ALCC projects that have not used a significant amount of their allocation will be adjusted during the year following the policies outlined on this page.

Refund Policy

If a system problem affects your run, ALCF will consider a refund of CPU hours. The ALCF expects all applications to regularly checkpoint, so refunds are typically capped at four hours of runtime for the affected job, unless the problem in question prevented checkpoints.

To request a refund, send the following information to support@alcf.anl.gov:

Refund Policy

In an effort to ensure our valuable computing resources are used judiciously, both Oak Ridge and Argonne have instituted a pullback policy. INCITE and ALCC projects that have not used a significant amount of their allocation will be adjusted during the year following the policies outlined on this page.

Reporting Policy for INCITE projects

The Department of Energy (DOE) requires the Argonne Leadership Computing Facility (ALCF) to provide quarterly reports on the progress of all INCITE projects.ALCF, in turn, requires PIs from all INCITE projects to complete a quarterly report and send it to their assigned Catalysts. Quarterly reports are due on or before the first day of the following quarter. 

Software Policy

All software used on ALCF computers must be appropriately acquired and used according to the appropriate licensing. Possession or use of illegally copied software is prohibited. Likewise, users shall not copy copyrighted software, except as permitted by the owner of the copyright. Currently, the use of export-controlled codes is prohibited.

User Authentication Policies

Users of the Argonne BG/P systems are required to authenticate via SSHv2 keys or CRYPTOCard one time passwords. This document explains the policies users must follow regarding SSHv2 keys and CRYPTOCard tokens for accessing the Argonne BG/P resources.

Vesta - Policy

ALCF Policy information for the Vesta Resource

Vesta-Policy-Storage

Vesta will have user and project quotas for all filesystems.
Quotas are determined at user and project request time.
Users may request modification to quotas by sending mail to support@alcf.anl.gov. Please include the reason for the modification.

vesta_home
Default quota is 50 GB

vesta_scratch
Default quota is 500 GB