Nimrod - Distributed Parametric Modelling Training Course
The ACCS hosted a 3 day hands-on Nimrod training course at the St Lucia campus of the University of Queensland from the 26th to the 28th of June 2006. Participants were encouraged to bring along their model and learn how to use Nimrod.
Course Presentations
Session 1: Nimrod/EnFuzion [pdf, 550k]
Session 2: Grid Computing [pdf, 2.2M]
Session 3: Nimrod/O [pdf, 880k]
Session 4, Part 1: Nimrod Case Studies [pdf, 930k]
Session 4, Part 2: Nimrod Projects [pdf, 500k]
Photo of course presenters and participants [jpeg, 680k]
Background
Modelling & simulation are key techniques for understanding complex systems. But the process of developing, calibrating and validating models can be extremely time consuming and prone to errors. Nimrod was developed to make this process much easier.
Nimrod is a system of middleware that enables models to be run in parallel on a Local Area Network, with a range of different parameter values. Nimrod provides facilities for automating the task of formulating, running and monitoring experiments, and collating the results. It can even search the parameter space to find values that give best fit of the model with user-defined properties. Nimrod incorporates a distributed scheduling component that can manage the scheduling of individual experiments to idle computers in a LAN. Together, these features mean that even complex parametric experiments can be defined and run with little programmer effort.
In many cases it is possible to establish a new experiment in minutes.
Nimrod has been applied successfully in a range of areas, including Air Traffic Control, Bioinformatics, Operations Research, Network Simulation, Electronic CAD and Ecological Modelling.
Nimrod was developed by Monash, a node of the ACCS. See: www.csse.monash.edu.au/~davida/nimrod/
