OU Research Cloud (OURcloud)
OU Research Cloud (OURcloud) is an internal research cloud resource that is available to OU employees and their research collaborators (including student researchers). OURcloud can also be used for coursework.
You can buy one or more portions of OURcloud, where each portion is 2 virtual CPU cores plus 16 GB of RAM.
The price is $347.19 per such portion, a one-time up-front purchase (not a recurring charge), good for 7 years.
An individual purchase from external funds (such as a grant) of more than $5,000 (at least 15 portions) isn't subject to Indirect Costs.
Typical Use Cases:
OURcloud is intended for use cases that aren't appropriate for batch computing on a supercomputer.
Examples include:
databases (in the SQL/Oracle/Postgres/MongoDB sense);
web services;
interactive computing;
Windows operating system.
Note that some interactive computing can be done on OSCER's supercomputer, for example via the srun command or Open OnDemand:
Current Open OnDemand interactive applications include:
Jupyter Lab/Jupyter Notebook
Rstudio Server
MATLAB
ANSYS Workbench
Spyder3
Virtual Servers:
An OURcloud virtual server can consist of one or more OURcloud portions, up to the physical limit of the OURcloud hardware.
CPUs:
Each OURcloud portion has 2 virtual CPU cores, corresponding to 2/3 of a physical CPU core. That is, OURcloud's virtual CPU cores are 3:1 oversubscribed (3 virtual CPU cores per physical CPU core), which is common in cloud environments.
RAM: Each OURcloud portion has 16 GB of physical RAM, non-oversubscribed (you get the full 16 GB).
Disk:
Each OURcloud virtual server comes with 30 GB of free disk space for each user, backed up nightly, for your software, scripts, small input files, etc. For larger storage, you can purchase OURdisk. You can have OURdisk space that's available only on your OURcloud virtual server(s), or available on both your OURcloud virtual server(s) and on OU IT's supercomputer. Note that OURdisk is NEVER BACKED UP, but see below.
Tape:
If you're using OURdisk, we STRONGLY URGE that you also buy tape cartridges for the OURRstore tape archive. This is because OURdisk is NEVER BACKED UP. But, you can archive files from OURdisk to OURRstore tape.
Questions about OURcloud? Contact support@oscer.ou.edu.
ALERT: When you want to purchase one or more OURcloud portions, that purchase request MUST be submitted by your department's financial lead, or by the Shared Business Services Center (sbsc@ou.edu) if that's what your department uses.
Especially, a researcher CANNOT submit an OURcloud purchase request; instead, a financial professional MUST submit that purchase request on the researcher's behalf.
The financial professional will need the "chartfield spread" to be able to submit that OURcloud purchase, which the Principal Investigator of that research project will be able to provide them.
To purchase OURcloud portions, click here.
| Cost | Availability |
|---|---|
$347.19 per portion* *1 portion = 2 virtual CPU cores + 16 GB RAM | This service is available to all OU employees. |
Features
Total Capacity
OURcloud's initial total capacity is 126 portions (2000+ GB RAM, 250+ virtual CPU cores), and this will grow with demand.
Operating Systems
An OURcloud virtual server can run Linux or Windows (but not MacOS nor iOS nor Android).
- For Linux, we have certain versions already available. If you want a specific version of Linux that's not yet provided, we might be able to add it, depending on the details.
- For Windows, we offer the latest stable version of Windows Datacenter, which allows up to 2 remote logins at a time. You can have more than 2 remote logins at a time for a modest upcharge.
Availability
OURcloud is available on demand, 24 x 7 x 365 (except during maintenance outages). Unlike commercial cloud resources, OURcloud isn't charged by the core-hour or instance-hour. Instead it is a one-time, up-front purchase that is good for 7 years, that also gives you and your team unrestricted remote access.
Access
OURcloud is available via remote access only.
Maintenance
The OU Supercomputing Center for Education & Research (OSCER), a division of OU IT, provides EXTREMELY BASIC setup and maintenance. For anything beyond EXTREMELY BASIC setup and maintenance, your team (or a system administrator you arrange) will maintain your virtual server -- OSCER doesn't provide that service.
User Accounts
EVERY user account on any OURcloud virtual server MUST first be created via OSCER's regular account creation procedure.
Installing Other Software Packages
You may install other software on your OURcloud virtual server.
Reliability
OURcloud is provided on an as-is, best-effort basis. OURcloud includes an OU IT-funded failover server. If an OURcloud physical server fails, the virtual servers running on the failed physical server can migrate to the failover server. Historically, the service has achieved ~99% uptime, which translates to ~100 hours of downtime per year (~1 business day of downtime per month on average).
NO "Egress" Charges for Downloading Your Data
You can download your data from your OURcloud virtual server at no charge, at any time.
Why 3:1 Oversubscription of CPU Cores?
OURcloud virtual servers aren't intended primarily for heavy number crunching (that's what OSCER's supercomputer is for).
So, CPU cores typically aren't fully consumed by the individual OURcloud virtual servers they're being used by.
And, affordable CPU chips come with relatively modest numbers of CPU cores, but their servers can have huge amounts of RAM.
Therefore, to reduce pricing for researchers, and in line with standard IT industry practice, OURcloud oversubscribes physical CPU cores 3:1 -- that is, each physical CPU core is split into 3 virtual CPU cores.
