diff --git a/about/index.rst b/about/index.rst index 3228df3b5..7d227c1e5 100644 --- a/about/index.rst +++ b/about/index.rst @@ -65,6 +65,7 @@ Science-IT :maxdepth: 2 science-it + science-it-history values-and-culture Science-IT is the organizational manifestation of Aalto Scientific diff --git a/about/science-it-history.rst b/about/science-it-history.rst new file mode 100644 index 000000000..95d63ff31 --- /dev/null +++ b/about/science-it-history.rst @@ -0,0 +1,89 @@ +History of Science-IT +===================== + +Our history explains how we are now, so here's a summary for those who +are interested. + + +2005: M-grid +------------ + +M-grid (name from "materials", as in physics stuff) was funded as a +Finnish Research Infrastructure (FIRI) project by the Academic of +Finland. It provided funding for local university department HPC +clusters and a collaboration to develop the configuration to run them. +The Helsinki University of Technology (predecessor to Aalto +University) cluster was named kvartsi ("qwartz"). +They were run together as a grid, where jobs submitted to one cluster +can also run on others. This was the start of one of the parts of the +Triton cluster. `Check out these old docs +`__ + + +2010: Finnish Grid Infrastructure and department collaboration +-------------------------------------------------------------- + +Eventually, M-grid grew within Aalto and became a collaboration +between several departments, mainly Biomedical Engineering and +Computational Science, Information and Computer Science, and Applied +Physics. Around the same time, the next FIRI project became the +"Finnish Grid Infrastructure". There was the joint Triton resource, +used by members of all departments. This is when the name +**Science-IT** emerged. Management was members of the IT groups of +the departments. Along with this was the merger of various computing +clusters to form the Aalto **Triton cluster**. + +In 201x, Triton hardware had grown enough that it moved to a machine +room run by CSC nearby. This provided more reliability, and further +professionalization of all of the management. + +During this time, Science-IT was still funded by FIRI, in the projects +"Finnish Grid Infrastructure" (FGI) and later the "Finnish Grid and +Cloud Infrastructure" (FGCI, starting in 2014, `ref +`__). +It provided continued growth, regular new hardware, and most +importantly a collaboration with other universities and CSC. + +Training was a part of Science-IT/FGI/FGCI from the beginning. +Courses began in earnest around 2015ish. We began yearly "HPC +Kickstart" courses as well as a wide variety of other courses on +specialty topics. Most were run by Aalto but all other university +affiliates in Finland were invited to attend. + + +2017ish: expanding the scope +---------------------------- + +Around 2017, there was a push towards expanded usability of the HPC +resources: now longer were they mainly focused on computational +experts, but were for a wider and wider audience. This basically meant +thinking about usability some, expanding our documentation to make it +clear we wanted to support others, and so on. This led to a +medium-term problem, where we found more people were trying to use the +cluster, but weren't fully prepared to do so. + + +2020s: Scientific computing support, not HPC support +---------------------------------------------------- + +Our solution was to, in 2020, start the **Research Software Engineer** +team. These were dedicated people hired not as cluster admins, but to +help others with their work, however it may be. This explicitly +included those who didn't come from computational fields and those who +haven't studied computing for all their careers. This turned out to +be a winning idea, and we slowly but constantly have been growing with +more users from all around Aalto. Our mission is no longer to only +support the Triton cluster, but to support computing in general: +Triton locally, CSC computers, or even smaller scale data and software +support. + +Around this time, the FGCI collaboration turned into the "Finnish +Computing Competence Infrastructure" to emphasize that its role is not +just hardware, but promoting the broader competence in computing at +the university level. + + +See also +-------- + +* `FCCI history at University of Helsinki `__.