Setting up RSM on Windows

Ansys Remote Solve Manager (RSM) is used by Ansys Workbench to submit jobs to high-performance computing clusters directly from Workbench on your computer. We show you the tips for Microsoft Windows Installation.

Note: In the Case of Installing ARC services when RSM is already present: 

Before beginning installing ARC services, make sure that the RSM Components in task manager are disabled. Go to Task Manager > Details > Find any processes named Ans.RSM and right click to turn off. 

1) Install ANSYS Products on the Head Node and Client Machines 

2) Add Firewall Exceptions:

• This is done in Windows Defender and/or Security software often managed by IT 
• Default Port numbers: 9195,11195,12195,13195 
  • 9195 = RSM Launcher service port 
  • 11195 = Port on Master and Execution nodes, allows incoming commands arcsubmit, arcstatus, etc 
  • 12195 = Master Communication Port, Master Node – allows incoming traffic from execution nodes 
  • 13195 = Node Communication Port, Port on Execution Node that allows incoming traffic from the master node 

The following setup is for the Remote Solve Machine (The machine where the simulation solving will occur). If you have multiple machines such as an HPC cluster, this will also apply to the Head Node of the cluster. 

3) Install RSM Services on the Remote Solve Machine (or Head Node)

3.1) Install Head Node Services - Launch a Command Prompt with Administrator Credentials:

• Install the ANSYS RSM launcher 
  • CD to C:/Program Files/ANSYS Inc/v222/RSM/bin 
  • Run ansconfigrsm.exe -launcher 
• Install ARC services – In this example the Computer is both the Head Node and a Compute Node 
  • CD to C:/Program Files/ANSYS Inc/v222/RSM/ARC/tools/win64 
  • Run installservice -arcmaster  
    • (This will allow you to modify settings towards making job queues) 
  • Run installservice -arcnode  
    • Note both services can be installed as installservice -arcmaster -arcnode 
    • (This will allow the machine to also be a compute node)  

3.2) Check Configuration and Password Cache:

• Go to RSM Configuration
  
• Choose Local Host and Submit a test job as if the RSM is being setup to run on the Compute Node, No file transfer needed. 
  
  
• In this case: Status - failed 
  
• Click on Report
  

3.3) Password needs to be cached:

• To Cache a password 
  • Run CMD prompt as Administrator 
  • CD to C:/Program Files/ANSYS Inc/v222/RSM/ARC/tools/win64 
  • Run arccredentials  
    • This will be for the currently logged in user 
    • For another user use the command arccredentials -user Username
      

4) Setup Staging Directory on the Head Node if desired:  

• SSD, Infiniband, etc preferred, can be on another server 
• Setup all users to have read/write access to the directory and subfolders 
• Scratch directory for RSM runs 
• Make sure there is enough space for jobs 
  
• HPC Side File Management: 
  • Use HPC staging directory if this is a one machine RSM configuration 
  • The other setting is to setup a Scratch Directory on each execution node if desired.  
  • If there is a slow network connection between compute nodes, there is a benefit to having each compute node configured with its own scratch directory 
  • There needs to be adequate drive space on each compute node and SSD’s or faster are recommended.
    
• Check box: Keep job files in staging directory when job is complete: 
  • Files in the staging directory remain until manually deleted 
  • Results can be retrieved manually if there is a network connection issue and the results are not transferred to the Client machine 
  • This will consume a lot of space and the staging directory will need to be managed manually often 
• Unchecked:
  • Results and files will be deleted from the staging directory when a user retrieves them
    
    Click Apply and the File Management tab will give you a green check mark before you can go to the next step. 
• Setting up a Queue:

• Default and Local are the queues that are automatically setup when you first run RSM setup on the RSM solver 
• You can rename these on the ARC configuration on the head node
  
• Click apply and Submit a Test job to the default Q
  
• Check the RSM Job Monitoring App
  
• Check the RSM Cluster Monitoring
  

Submitting Jobs from Mechanical 

• Use Solve Process settings, Click Add Queue and Name it
  

• Choose the RSM Queue, HPC Type ARC (that is the default job scheduler), Job Name as you wish, Check the license, you may want to use ANSYS Mechanical Enterprise Solver
  

• Choose number of cores, License Queuing, etc.
  

• Choose This New Q HPC Cluster
  

• Get Results after the Solve
  

Installing RSM for Compute Nodes (This is not the Head Node) 

• Install RSM on each compute node
  
• Launch Command prompt as Administrator 
  • CD to C:/Program Files/ANSYS Inc/v222/RSM/ARC/tools/win64 
  • Run installservice -arcnode 
  • Note folder name above v222 is for Version 2022R2, Version 2023R1 will have folder name v231, Version 2023R2 v232, etc. 

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