1CHARLIECLOUD(7)                  Charliecloud                  CHARLIECLOUD(7)
2
3
4

NAME

6       charliecloud  -  Lightweight user-defined software stacks for high-per‐
7       formance computing
8

WHAT IS CHARLIECLOUD?

10       Charliecloud provides user-defined software stacks (UDSS) for high-per‐
11       formance  computing (HPC) centers. This “bring your own software stack”
12       functionality addresses needs such as:
13
14       • software dependencies that are numerous,  complex,  unusual,  differ‐
15         ently  configured,  or  simply  newer/older than what the center pro‐
16         vides;
17
18       • build-time requirements unavailable within the center, such as  rela‐
19         tively unfettered internet access;
20
21       • validated  software stacks and configuration to meet the standards of
22         a particular field of inquiry;
23
24       • portability of environments between resources, including workstations
25         and other test and development system not managed by the center;
26
27       • consistent  environments, even archivally so, that can be easily, re‐
28         liabily, and verifiably reproduced in the future; and/or
29
30       • usability and comprehensibility.
31

HOW DOES IT WORK?

33       Charliecloud uses Linux user namespaces to run containers with no priv‐
34       ileged  operations or daemons and minimal configuration changes on cen‐
35       ter resources.  This simple approach avoids most security  risks  while
36       maintaining  access to the performance and functionality already on of‐
37       fer.
38
39       Container images can be built using Docker or anything  else  that  can
40       generate a standard Linux filesystem tree.
41

HOW DO I LEARN MORE?

43       • Documentation: https://hpc.github.io/charliecloud
44
45       • GitHub repository: https://github.com/hpc/charliecloud
46
47       • Low-traffic        mailing        list       for       announcements:
48         https://groups.io/g/charliecloud
49
50       • We wrote an article for USENIX’s magazine ;login:  that  explains  in
51         more  detail  the motivation for Charliecloud and the technology upon
52         which                  it                  is                  based:
53         https://www.usenix.org/publications/login/fall2017/priedhorsky
54
55       • A   more   technical  resource  is  our  Supercomputing  2017  paper:
56         https://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=3126925
57

WHO IS RESPONSIBLE?

59       Contributors:
60
61       • Rusty Davis <rustyd@lanl.gov>
62
63       • Hunter Easterday <heasterday@lanl.gov>
64
65       • Oliver Freyermuth <o.freyermuth@googlemail.com>
66
67       • Shane Goff <rgoff@lanl.gov>
68
69       • Michael Jennings <mej@lanl.gov>
70
71       • Christoph Junghans <junghans@lanl.gov>
72
73       • Dave Love <dave.love@manchester.ac.uk>
74
75       • Jordan Ogas <jogas@lanl.gov>
76
77       • Kevin Pelzel <kpelzel@lanl.gov>
78
79       • Megan Phinney <mphinney@lanl.gov>
80
81       • Reid Priedhorsky <reidpr@lanl.gov>, co-founder and project lead
82
83       • Tim Randles <trandles@lanl.gov>, co-founder
84
85       • Matthew Vernon <mv3@sanger.ac.uk>
86
87       • Peter Wienemann <wienemann@physik.uni-bonn.de>
88
89       • Lowell Wofford <lowell@lanl.gov>
90

HOW CAN I PARTICIPATE?

92       Use our GitHub page: https://hpc.github.io/charliecloud
93
94       Bug reports and feature requests should be  filed  as  “Issues”.  Ques‐
95       tions,  comments,  support requests, and everything else should use our
96       “Discussions”.  Don’t worry if you put something in  the  wrong  place;
97       we’ll be more than happy to help regardless.
98
99       We     also     have     a     mailing    list    for    announcements:
100       https://groups.io/g/charliecloud
101
102       Patches are much appreciated on the software itself as well as documen‐
103       tation.   Optionally,  please  include in your first patch a credit for
104       yourself in the list above.
105
106       We are friendly and welcoming of diversity on all dimensions.
107

HOW DO I CITE CHARLIECLOUD?

109       If Charliecloud helped your research, or it was useful to  you  in  any
110       other  context  where  bibliographic  citations are appropriate, please
111       cite the following open-access paper:
112          Reid Priedhorsky and Tim Randles. “Charliecloud:  Unprivileged  con‐
113          tainers for user-defined software stacks in HPC”, 2017. In Proc. Su‐
114          percomputing.  DOI: 10.1145/3126908.3126925.
115
117       Charliecloud is copyright © 2014–2021 Triad National Security, LLC.
118
119       This   software   was   produced   under   U.S.   Government   contract
120       89233218CNA000001  for  Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL), which is
121       operated by Triad National Security, LLC for the U.S. Department of En‐
122       ergy/National Nuclear Security Administration.
123
124       This  is  open  source software (LA-CC 14-096); you can redistribute it
125       and/or modify it under the terms of the Apache License, Version 2.0.  A
126       copy  is included in file LICENSE. You may not use this software except
127       in compliance with the license.
128
129       The Government is granted for itself and others acting on its behalf  a
130       nonexclusive,  paid-up,  irrevocable worldwide license in this material
131       to reproduce, prepare derivative works, distribute copies to  the  pub‐
132       lic,  perform publicly and display publicly, and to permit others to do
133       so.
134
135       Neither the government nor Triad National Security, LLC makes any  war‐
136       ranty,  express  or  implied,  or assumes any liability for use of this
137       software.
138
139       If software is modified to produce derivative  works,  such  derivative
140       works  should  be clearly marked, so as not to confuse it with the ver‐
141       sion available from LANL.
142
143   Reporting bugs
144       If Charliecloud was obtained from your  Linux  distribution,  use  your
145       distribution’s bug reporting procedures.
146
147       Otherwise, report bugs to: <https://github.com/hpc/charliecloud/issues>
148

SEE ALSO

150       ch-build(1),  ch-build2dir(1), ch-builder2squash(1), ch-builder2tar(1),
151       ch-checkns(1),    ch-dir2squash(1),    ch-fromhost(1),     ch-image(1),
152       ch-mount(1),  ch-pull2dir(1), ch-pull2tar(1), ch-run(1), ch-run-oci(1),
153       ch-ssh(1), ch-tar2dir(1) ch-tar2dir(1), ch-test(1), ch-umount(1)
154
155       Full documentation at: <https://hpc.github.io/charliecloud>
156

NOTE

158       These man pages are for Charliecloud version 0.25 (Git commit 0.25).
159
161       2014–2021, Triad National Security, LLC
162
163
164
165
1660.25                         2021-09-20 00:00 UTC              CHARLIECLOUD(7)
Impressum