Scratch Storage

From Stat DS Computing Wiki

Scratch storage is a location where you can store data directly on the machine. These locations use faster flash based storage, which is better suited for the heavy reading and writing of data.

Every time you read/write from your "/home/yourusername" directory, you are accessing a remote storage location. This is slower to begin with, especially if other users are running read/write heavy jobs.

Storage Terminology

NVME SSD - Fast flash based storage. Smaller available storage size.

Spinning Disk Storage - Slow mechanical hard drive with spinning disks. Larger available storage size

Each Leviathan is equipped with a 4TB NVME SSD (faster than the NAS). This allows for heavy reading and writing at high speeds. Utilizing this space can speed up your jobs, and help with congestion on the NAS.

Scratch Storage location on Each Leviathan

/scratch

You can view the amount of space used at /scratch for each leviathan here.

Steps to use Scratch Storage
  1. Make a folder in /scratch location.
    • sudo mkdir /scratch/foldern1
  2. Change ownership of the folder to you.
    • sudo chown $USER:$USER /scratch/folder1
  3. Update permissions on folder (modify as needed.)
    1. chmod 750 /scratch/folder1