Scenario: When to Use Job Submission or Job Activation Filters in Windows HPC Server 2008

Applies To: Windows HPC Server 2008

This section of the Creating and Installing Job Submission and Activation Filters in Windows HPC Server 2008 Step-by-Step Guide provides guidelines for when to use custom filters to manage job that are submitted to your cluster.

In Windows® HPC Server 2008, the three management tools that you can use to define and enforce site-specific and customized job submission policies are job templates, job submission filters, and job activation filters.

Job templates are the primary tool for managing jobs that are submitted to your cluster. Job templates define default values and restraints for job properties, and also define which users can submit jobs using the job template. For information about how job templates work, and how to create job templates, see Job Templates.

In some cases, you may want to provide additional checks and controls on jobs that are submitted to your cluster, or even change job property values. You can enforce site-specific job submission policies and job activation policies by creating custom filters.

A job submission filter checks the job description file for options that are disallowed or for the failure to include a required option. A job submission filter can also change job property values. For example, you might want to enforce that all jobs that are submitted by a particular user are assigned to a particular job template. This can be done by configuring a submission filter that checks the job description file for the job owner, and then changes the value of the job template field accordingly.

Note

Submission filters allow you to change job property values only. Task property options cannot be changed using a submission filter.

A job activation filter checks the job description file for factors that would cause the job to fail if activated. If the filter detects the condition, it prevents the job from activating. For example, the activation filter can check for the unavailability of licenses or exceeded usage time for the submitting user.

The following table provides examples of the types of submission policies that you can enforce with the different job submission management tools:

Management tool	Job submission policy
Job templates	Enforce run time and size limits on jobs Limit job priority Send different types of jobs to different sets of nodes Partition the cluster for different user groups Simplify job submission for the user
Job submission filter	Systematically assign specific job templates based on information of your choosing Change job property values Check for options that are disallowed Check for the failure to include a required option Check or enforce extended options (new job options that were created by editing the job schema)
Job activation filter	Determine whether or not a job should run Check for the availability of licenses Enforce restraints on cluster usage time for individual users or groups