Compiling From Source

Compiling software from source is the most involved option for using software on RC, but it gives the user the highest level of control. Research computing software is often developed by academic researchers that do not place a large effort on packaging their software so that it can be easily deployed on other systems. If the developer does not package the software using a package manager, then the only option is to build the software from source. It is best to follow the installation instructions from the developer to successfully install the software from source. It is recommended to build software on a node with the same processor type that will be used for running the software. On a compute node, running the following command displays the processor type:  

$ cat /sys/devices/cpu/caps/pmu_name

  Software builds are not typically back-compatible and will not run successfully on processors older than the processor used to build. It is recommended to build on haswell (the oldest processor architecture on RC) if you wish to have full compatibility across all RC compute nodes. To optimize for performance, however, build on the same processor on which the software runs.