[Paraview] client/server display problem
Wylie, Brian
bnwylie at sandia.gov
Tue May 16 15:09:55 EDT 2006
Renato,
Sandia runs on LOTS of clusters that don't have graphics cards. We NEVER run in data server mode (I personally believe that mode is not useful...ever... (waiting for the flames on that statement... :) )
Anyway you simply compile the server with mesa and the client with opengl.
Here's an example use case....
Person starts up client/server...
1) the polygonal data generated is less than 10MB so the data gets sent to the client to be rendered. The client has opengl so the rendering is fast.
2) the polygonal data is more than 10MB so the polygons are rendered on the server and images sent to the client.
2a) User doesn't want that to happen so they turn off compositing and the data is always sent to the client
2b) User is fine with the rendering being done with Mesa, so they do nothing.
The only question that one might ask is why would anyone want 2b) there are plenty of good answers to this one. The easiest one to communicate is the following... I have 400 timesteps, I hit play on the VCR controls, the LAST thing I want is to download 400 x >10MB of geometry to my client just to play the animation.
In fact, many sandia users slide the Compositing threshold to 0MB (yes this is true) when using Mesa. One of the nice things about using Mesa is grabbing the framebuffer is instantaneous so you can actually get about 20 frames/sec image delivery on smaller data.
Brian Wylie - Org 9227
Sandia National Laboratories
MS 0822 - Building 880/A1-J
(505)844-2238 FAX(505)845-0833
____ _ __
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/ /_/ / __ `/ ___/ __ `/ | / / / _ \ | /| / /
/ ____/ /_/ / / / /_/ /| |/ / / __/ |/ |/ /
/_/ \__,_/_/ \__,_/ |___/_/\___/|__/|__/
Unleash the Beast
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Renato N. Elias [mailto:rnelias at nacad.ufrj.br]
> Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 12:52 PM
> To: Wylie, Brian
> Cc: paraview at paraview.org
> Subject: RES: [Paraview] client/server display problem
>
>
> Sorry, but I'm still in doubt...
>
> Maybe my doubt is due the way I'm running the client/server
> mode. I should emphasize that I'm running in a client/DATA
> server mode using a SGI Altix which doesn't have any
> rendering capability. Thus, here goes my questions...
>
> BRIAN: 1) Set up their server nodes so that they can open X
> windows (Sandia has done this on like 10 different clusters,
> it's not that hard, if you need instructions please email me).
>
> RENATO: Why? If I'm running in a client/data server scheme my
> data server only need to load and dispatch my data to the
> client which should launch the PV GUI. I can't see why is it
> necessary to open X windows in this case.
>
>
> BRIAN: 2) Compile the server with Mesa (note: the client
> should never be compiled with Mesa)
>
> RENATO: The question remains. Is it really necessary to
> compile PV with Mesa support in a system without rendering capability?
>
> Thanks a lot for your feedback Brian
>
> Renato N. Elias
> ===============================================
> PhD student - http://www.nacad.ufrj.br/~rnelias High
> Performance Computing Center Federal University of Rio de
> Janeiro Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
> +55(21) 2562-8080
>
>
>
> -----Mensagem original-----
> De: paraview-bounces+rnelias=nacad.ufrj.br at paraview.org
> [mailto:paraview-bounces+rnelias=nacad.ufrj.br at paraview.org]
> Em nome de
> Wylie, Brian
> Enviada em: terça-feira, 16 de maio de 2006 13:39
> Para: Jack Gundrum; Christoph Moder
> Cc: ParaView at paraview.org
> Assunto: RE: [Paraview] client/server display problem
>
> All,
>
> I haven't followed the entire thread, but just wanted to
> mention that in
> general 'forwarding X' when running ParaView client/server is
> a very bad
> idea (performance 20x slower and bypassing all the image
> delivery work in
> ParaView).
>
> When running in client/server folks should do one of the following two
> things:
> 1) Set up their server nodes so that they can open X windows
> (Sandia has
> done this on like 10 different clusters, it's not that hard,
> if you need
> instructions please email me).
> 2) Compile the server with Mesa (note: the client should
> never be compiled
> with Mesa)
>
> Brian Wylie - Org 9227
> Sandia National Laboratories
> MS 0822 - Building 880/A1-J
> (505)844-2238 FAX(505)845-0833
> ____ _ __
> / __ \____ _________ | | / (_)__ _ __
> / /_/ / __ `/ ___/ __ `/ | / / / _ \ | /| / /
> / ____/ /_/ / / / /_/ /| |/ / / __/ |/ |/ /
> /_/ \__,_/_/ \__,_/ |___/_/\___/|__/|__/
>
> Unleash the Beast
>
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: paraview-bounces+bnwylie=sandia.gov at paraview.org
> > [mailto:paraview-bounces+bnwylie=sandia.gov at paraview.org]
> On Behalf Of
> > Jack Gundrum
> > Sent: Tuesday, May 16, 2006 9:32 AM
> > To: Christoph Moder
> > Cc: ParaView at paraview.org
> > Subject: Re: [Paraview] client/server display problem
> >
> > Hi Christoph,
> >
> > So when paraview running in parallel tries to open a
> process on other
> > nodes it uses X forwarding? The X forwarding from my
> cluster server to
> > laptop client works fine if I dont run in parallel (i.e.
> mpirun) so X
> > forwarding is working untill I use mpirun.
> >
> > Should I be compiling paraview with offscreen rendering to avoid X
> > forwarding among cluster nodes?
> >
> >
> >
> > Christoph Moder wrote:
> >
> > >> I have paraview compiled with mpich using rsh instead of
> > ssh, would
> > >> this create a problem when running.
> > >
> > >
> > > On many systems rsh is a link to ssh.
> > >
> > >> My server connects to my client and launches the
> splashscreen but
> > >> then hangs with "unable to open display".
> > >> Everything works fine without mpirun?
> > >
> > >
> > > Remote connections to the X server are often disabled (startx
> > > --nolisten tcp). But ssh can be told to forward all X
> connections;
> > > write in your ~/.ssh/config:
> > > HOST *
> > > ForwardX11 yes
> > >
> > > Christoph
> >
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > ParaView mailing list
> > ParaView at paraview.org
> > http://www.paraview.org/mailman/listinfo/paraview
> >
> >
>
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