What is a Slurm Account?

A Slurm account is a resource allocation entity used to manage and organize computing resources on a Supercomputer. It differs from your user account, which identifies you as an individual on the system. Instead, Slurm accounts group users based on their affiliation, such as research groups, classes, or projects.

Key Differences Between a Slurm Account and a User Account

1. User Account: Your individual identity on the cluster, tied to your username and credentials.

2. Slrum Slurm Account: A resource grouping to track and manage usage, such as computing time, priorities, and fairshare policies.

You may belong to one or more Slurm accounts, depending on your affiliations.

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Why You Might Belong to Multiple Slurm Accounts

1. Multiple Research Groups: If you conduct work for two or more research groups, each may have its own Slurm account.

2. Class Projects: Students enrolled in academic courses with Supercomputer assignments will receive Slurm accounts specific to the class.

3. Collaborations: Collaborators on interdisciplinary projects may gain access to multiple accounts to work across different teams.

Quality of Service (QoS) and Slurm Accounts

The Quality of Service (QoS) options available to you depends on the Slurm account you’re submitting jobs under. Different accounts may have different QoS options, which define job limits such as runtime, memory, and priority. For example, class accounts can only submit to the class QoS. When submitting a job, always verify the QoS associated with your chosen Slurm account.

How Slurm Accounts Affect Fairshare

Fairshare determines your job’s priority relative to others and is calculated based on past resource usage within a Slurm account. If you belong to multiple Slurm accounts, your usage is tracked separately for each account.

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Commands to Manage and Check Slurm Accounts

Check Fairshare Across All Accounts:

myfairshare

This command displays your fairshare usage for all accounts you belong to.

Example Output:

myfairshare 
Account         User      RawUsage_CHE  RawFairShare  TargetFairShare  RealFairShare
grp_mylab1      jeburks2  3.4           0.619309      0.9997664        0.6193090
class_asu101sp+ jeburks2  20.6          0.061676      0.9985728        0.0616760

Thie user jeburks2 has two accounts with usage on both. The RawUsage_CHE shows the number of Core-Hour-Equivalents run under this account that are used to calculate fairshare, and the RealFairShare column shows the fairshare value for this account. For more information on Fairshare, see Slurm Fairshare Score

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List Your Slurm Accounts and Associations and QoS’s:

myaccounts

Example Output:

myaccounts
      User         Def Acct          Account                              QOS 
---------- ---------------- ---------------- -------------------------------- 
  jeburks2       grp_mylab1       grp_mylab1             debug,private,public
  jeburks2       grp_mylab1 class_asu101spr+                            class

The user jeburks2 belongs to two accounts:

1. Research group account: grp_mylab1

   • This account is the default account (Def Acct) and will be used for job submissions unless the -A flag specifies a different account.

   • It supports the QoS levels: debug, private, and public.

2. Class account: class_asu101spring2025

   • This account allows submitting jobs only to the class QoS.

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Submitting Jobs To Different Slurm Accounts

To target a specific account for a job, you can specify the -A flag with the account name. If -A is not specified, the job will be submitted to your default account.

interactive -A grp_mylab
interactive -A class_asu101spring2025

#SBATCH -A grp_mylab
#SBATCH -A class_asu101spring2025

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Changing Your Default Slurm Account

If you have multiple slurm accounts and wish to change your default slurm account, please contact Research Computing to make this change. See the Additional Help section below

Practical Example

If you are working on both a research project and taking a class that uses the cluster:

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Understanding Slurm accounts ensures efficient and fair usage of cluster resources while respecting the allocations and policies of your affiliations. Always choose the appropriate account for your job to optimize your resource usage and priorities.

Additional Help

We also offer a series of Educational Opportunities and Workshops.