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    Mission / Euler CPU
    03 / 0535 active minutesshared compute

    Measure And Right-Size An Euler Job

    You can interpret sacct and seff, calculate requested resources, distinguish successful from efficient, and adjust only the next request using representative evidence.

    Work hereeuler / bash
    1. 1Understand
    2. 2Do
    3. 3Check
    4. 4Submit
    Learn firstConcept, example, trap and recovery

    Outcome#

    You can interpret sacct and seff, calculate requested resources, distinguish successful from efficient, and adjust only the next request using representative evidence.

    Concept#

    Large “just in case” requests reduce availability and may wait longer without improving a serial or I/O-bound program. A completed state alone does not prove appropriate resource use.

    Worked Example#

    The proposed request follows measured utilization and does not enlarge resources merely to hide an error.

    A correct example uses these decisions:

    • Which value helps estimate memory actually used? MaxRSS, interpreted with the job steps and units.
    • A job exits immediately with a Python import error. What should you optimize first? Fix and test the software environment before changing resources.
    • A representative serial job requested 4 CPUs, 16 GiB per CPU, and 2 hours. It completed in 20 minutes with 22% CPU efficiency and 9 GiB MaxRSS. Which next test is justified? Test 1 CPU, 16 GiB total memory, and 45 minutes on a representative input.

    Common Trap#

    Treating requested memory as measured memory, or increasing every resource after a software failure.

    If Blocked#

    Do not increase resources when fields are unclear. Use Euler resource optimization and ask for help for MPI/multiprocess workloads, highly variable inputs, or disagreeing metrics.

    Useful references:

    Understand Before Accepting AI Output#

    Verify arithmetic, per-CPU versus total memory, representativeness, and the parallelism claim. An agent cannot infer scaling merely from CPU availability.

    Do the mission

    One bounded attempt

    Pass: 80% + every safety item
    Action

    Inspect the recorded tiny-job sacct and seff output, then choose a justified next CPU, memory, and time request.

    Expected

    The proposed request follows measured utilization and does not enlarge resources merely to hide an error.

    Run only the commands for your machine

    Step 1euler / bash
    read -r -p 'Job ID from the previous mission: ' job_id
sacct -X -j "$job_id" --format=JobID,State,ExitCode,Elapsed,AllocCPUS,ReqMem,MaxRSS
seff "$job_id"

    Expected: The same completed job appears in sacct, followed by its requested-versus-used efficiency summary.

    01Which value helps estimate memory actually used?
    02A job exits immediately with a Python import error. What should you optimize first?Safety-critical
    03A representative serial job requested 4 CPUs, 16 GiB per CPU, and 2 hours. It completed in 20 minutes with 22% CPU efficiency and 9 GiB MaxRSS. Which next test is justified?Safety-critical
    Confirm the result you personally observed

    These values are processed only by the local launcher. Private paths are not written to the public submission.

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