Starting a Proxy Server on a Host

You can specify a host on which to start a proxy server using the -proxy <host> option.

You can use the -proxy option with both serial and parallel simulations, and all methods of specifying the hosts where the simulation runs, including the -batchsystem command-line argument. To expose simulations that are running on clusters to workstations outside the cluster’s private network, use the -proxy option.

A typical command to enter in the command line is:

starccm+ -batch -np 64 -machinefile hostfile -rsh ssh -proxy cluster-head mycase.sim

where:

• -batch is the argument that is used to run the case in batch mode

• -np 64 specifies the number of cores to use (64 in this example)

• -machinefile hostfile is the configuration file for the host you want to spawn the proxy server on

• -rsh ssh is the shell that you want to use to spawn a proxy server on the specified host. By default, the secure shell (ssh) is used. You can specify to use the remote shell (rsh) by adding -rsh rsh to the command line.

• -proxy cluster-head is the head node of the cluster you want to connect to.

• mycase.sim is the name of the simulation file you want to connect to

The proxy server appears in the Servers tab in Simcenter STAR-CCM+. You can connect a client to this server. The proxy server continues running until the connection with the parent server is lost.

On startup, the Output window shows:

Server::start -host cluster-node-01:47827

This message identifies which host the server is running on and the port number on which the server is listening for client connections. In the example above, the host is cluster-node-01 and the port number is 47827 (which is the default Simcenter STAR-CCM+ port number).

Additionally, the output also displays:

ProxyServer:start -host cluster-head:47827

This message identifies the host and port number of the proxy server. In the example above, the cluster’s head node is cluster-head and the port number is 47827. The port numbers of the server and proxy server do not have to be the same.

You can now connect to either the server or proxy server using the respective host and port combinations. If connecting to the server from outside the cluster, it is likely that you cannot see the cluster nodes (such as cluster-node-01) but are able to see the cluster’s head node (cluster-head). In this case, connect through the proxy server.

Connecting to the proxy server grants you the same access to the simulation as connecting directly to the server.