The seminar had been originally planned for late March but had to be rescheduled on short notice to this date.

CASUS Hands-on Software Seminar, Franz Pöschel, Center for Advanced Systems Understanding CASUS, Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf (HZDR)

Abstract of the talk// This seminar talk presents openPMD, an open and F.A.I.R. standard for particle-mesh data, and its impact in heterogeneous scientific workflows. Modern scientific compute models often consist of multiple distinct stages, leading to data processing pipelines consisting of multiple heterogeneous codes. Standardization of scientific data helps bridging the different models with a commonly-understood markup, creating interoperable and flexible workflows.

The openPMD standard is made accessible to scientific software via the openPMD-api, a library for the description of scientific data. The backend implementations of the openPMD-api are based on established I/O framworks such as HDF5 and ADIOS2, and also include a scalable streaming backend for HPC workflows, provided by ADIOS2. The talk gives an insight into the existing ecosystem of openPMD and describes the basic concepts of the data markup.

Within the talk Franz will illuminate recent trends and challenges in large-scale I/O and their impact on scientific compute workflows. While traditional attempts at counteracting such trends, e.g. through compression, remain available in the openPMD-api, Franz and his team propose loose coupling and online analysis via streaming workflows as a sustainable solution that avoids parallel filesystem bottlenecks.
A short hands-on session will demonstrate how to create and interact with openPMD data.

This talk will also shortly demonstrate the openPMD Python API as well as the openPMD-viewer. For those who want to optionally follow along on their own devices, installation instructions can be found at OpenPMD-api and GitHub. A sample dataset will be available shortly.

Franz will be talking live in Görlitz. However, as the event is organized in a hybrid format that includes a videoconferencing tool by Zoom Inc., people interested in the topic have the chance to also join the talk remotely. Please ask for the login details via contact@casus.science.