End User License Agreement (EULA)

CIRC Resource Usage Policies and Guidelines

The following policies and guidelines have been agreed upon by the Center for Institutional Research Computing (CIRC) Advisory Committee. These policies and guidelines may be amended from time to time.

By using CIRC high-performance computing resources you (the “user”) agree to the following.

Accounts

  1. Every user account is associated with a faculty sponsor. Sponsors are responsible for properly vetting users working under their auspices and for the behavior of these users. Users agree that sponsors for their account are entitled to regulate, limit, suspend, or terminate their access.
  2. Accounts that are not used for more than a year are subject to deletion. Access to CIRC resources will end six months after users are no longer affiliated with WSU.
  3. Users agree to acknowledge the use of CIRC resources in publications. The following wording is recommended: “This research used resources of the Center for Institutional Research Computing at Washington State University.”
  4. Users agree to protect their access credentials in accordance with WSU EP-16 University Network Policies.
  5. Users agree to comply with applicable WSU policies, contracts, and legal obligations, including intellectual property rights and confidentiality agreements.
  6. Users agree that violations of the policies in this EULA may result in loss of access to CIRC resources, including termination of accounts.

Usage

  1. CIRC resources are to be used primarily for research. They can be used for instruction only with prior approval from CIRC.
  2. CIRC resources should not be used to process, store, or transmit confidential or regulated information as defined in WSU EP-8 and BPPM-87 unless expressly permitted by this EULA. CIRC resources do not meet the standards of NIST CUI, DoD NISPOM, HIPAA, EAR, or ITAR, and should not be used to process, store, or transmit information governed by these regulations. Users that access data subject to the NIH Genomic Data Sharing Policy on CIRC resources agree to comply with the terms and conditions for use of such data. In general, the use of cloud services that support security standards and compliance certifications is recommended for the processing of confidential or regulated information.
  3. All applications and installs must be run on compute nodes and should either be submitted to a job queue using sbatch or run interactively using idev. Applications or installs running on any login node will be subject to immediate termination without notice.
  4. Investors have priority access to the nodes they own. Jobs running in the shared backfill partition, that spans all nodes and which allows the use of idle resources by all users, are subject to preemption if an investor’s job needs their own resources to be able to run. Users are responsible for check-pointing their backfill jobs to be able to restart efficiently in the event of preemption.
  5. Because CIRC resources are shared among all users, users should gauge their needs accurately and avoid oversubscribing in their requests for compute resources.
  6. Licensed software may only be installed on CIRC resources if the license permits its use for research on multiple computers across a network. Users are responsible for ensuring that any software they install or request to be installed on CIRC resources abides by license agreements.

Storage

  1. Each user is provided a home folder of 100GB at no cost, and each sponsor in addition is provided a lab folder of 500GB at no cost. Additional lab storage can be rented on an annual basis through the CIRC service center. In the case of lapsed rentals, lab storage in excess of its rented capacity will be made read-only for one year and then archived offline.
  2. Data on home and lab folders is backed up twice a year. Additional backups beyond that are the responsibility of the user.
  3. Temporary scratch storage is available to all users for their jobs. Scratch directories are subject to automatic deletion, without notice, when their time limit of two weeks expires.

Maintenance

  1. The use of CIRC resources and services is at the user’s own risk. CIRC will use its best efforts to maintain a functional research computing resource but makes no warranty that resources or services will be available at all times, that they will suit every purpose, or that data will never be lost or corrupted.
  2. CIRC resources may be periodically unavailable for scheduled maintenance. Notice of these events will be provided.
  3. CIRC resources may be unavailable without notice, and running jobs may be subject to termination, if hardware, software, or other issues necessitate immediate maintenance to prevent interruption or loss of service.
  4. Users shall comply with requests by CIRC staff regarding job submission and resource usage that are needed to prevent interruption or loss of service.
  5. Investor nodes whose warranty has expired will remain in service at the owner’s discretion, so long as they are maintained in a functional state by the owner and there are sufficient resources in the data center facility to support them. The node’s owner will be responsible for providing any needed funds for replacement of parts that are out-of-warranty, and CIRC will coordinate their purchase and installation. Decommissioned nodes will be returned to the owner, if they so choose, along with the chassis enclosure if enough nodes are returned to fill it.