At DiRAC we strive to keep our community up to date with the latest technologies. From the very beginning we have proactively engaged with manufacturers and suppliers to secure cutting edge systems for use by DiRAC users.
DiRAC Hackathons are usually held as three-day (in-person or remote) events, where teams of researchers get to work together on their own codes, sharing ideas and experience and developing good practice, in the company of vendor technology specialists. In-house experts from the DiRAC RSE and technical teams are also on hand to provide specialist advice on how to best use our systems. Users work to optimise their codes and test new software and hardware to gain performance efficiencies and greater insight into particular methodologies.
Often, our hackathons are preceded by two-day online training events, presented in lecture format by vendor specialists and covering the basics of the particular hardware or software. These are aimed at both introducing all users to new techniques and also at preparing potential hackathon participants so they can make the best possible use of the one-to-one specialist support available at the in-person event.
Hackathons give an opportunity for the manufacturer to present their technology, and give training and support our researchers modifying their codes. They are not designed to be training sessions, where vendors roll out their training material with pre-packaged sample code for trainees to run passively. Rather, they are a platform to help researchers assess the impact of a technology on their particular research code.
All our courses are advertised by ‘All User’ email and on our twitter, mastodon and linked-in Channels.
