Compute

Compute

The question is never "which cloud is best"; it is "which of the targets this user has configured fits this run, and what will it cost". Discover before you plan, size before you dispatch, and hand anything longer than a coffee to the job system so the session, the logs and the metrics outlive the shell.

Rules

1. Targets first. compute_job {"action":"targets"} lists what exists: local runtime, saved SSH and scheduler hosts, Modal when connected. Plan only against a listed target. A provider skill from the library (modal-serverless-gpu, runpod-gpu-cloud, lambda-gpu-cloud, vast-ai-gpu-cloud, skypilot-multi-cloud-orchestration, together-ai-inference, fireworks-ai-inference, tinker-fine-tuning; the core index lists them) is loaded only when that provider is configured or the user asks to set it up; never plan work for compute the user does not have.
2. Local shell for seconds, kernel for interactive state, job for everything else. A command that may exceed a few minutes, needs a GPU, or must survive a disconnect goes through compute_job start, then compute_job wait; never a shell sleep loop.
3. Size and price before dispatch. Estimate wall-clock from a short local or scaled-down run, choose the smallest instance that fits memory and time, and state the estimate (provider, GPU, duration, price) in the approval. Remote jobs are approved against an immutable plan digest; compute_job plan previews it.
4. Declare outputs. Artifacts and checkpoints are relative paths under the job workspace, listed in the request, so they are delivered and survive. Nothing important is written to /tmp or printed only to the terminal.
5. Track metrics. Training and evaluation scripts import openscience_track (or wandb, shimmed inside a study) so curves and final numbers land in the Autoresearch pane and the experiments tool instead of a log to grep.
6. Checkpoint long runs and make them resumable from the declared checkpoint path; the job system can be interrupted by the user, a budget, or a kill rule.

Choosing the target

For a Slurm or PBS host, resources (cpus, gpus, memory_gb, time_minutes, partition) become the scheduler request; modules and container load the environment. For Modal, packages or image define the environment and outbound network is off unless enabled in Compute settings; do not submit jobs that download models or data without checking that setting.

Workflow

• targets: what exists.
• Probe: a scaled-down local run to measure time and memory per unit of work.
• Size: instance, duration, price; write the estimate.
• plan (remote) then start with name, purpose, command, cwd, artifacts, checkpoint.
• wait; read logs on failure; artifacts on success.

Probe. Ten training steps or one batch locally, timed, tells you the throughput; scale to the full run and add 20%. Memory: a single forward and backward pass at the target batch size. If the probe cannot run locally, read the model card or the paper for reported throughput on the target GPU and say the estimate is second-hand.

Pricing. Duration × the provider's hourly rate for the instance, plus storage or egress when relevant. Give one number and its basis; for anything over a few dollars, or any run over an hour, state it before dispatch even under an autonomous setting.

Failure. compute_job logs first, with enough bytes to reach the traceback. Fix the cause, not the symptom; a retry of an identical command is only justified after a transient failure (preemption, network). Interrupted jobs resume from the checkpoint.

Provider accounts

Credentials live in Customize → Compute. provider_compute reads account, inventory and job status for TensorPool, Lambda, Prime Intellect, Vast.ai and RunPod through the host broker, read-only. Never ask the user to paste a key into chat, never put a key in a shell command, and never claim a run happened that the job record does not show.

Before you hand it over

• The job's name says what it computed; its artifacts are declared and delivered.
• The estimate you gave is compared with what it actually took.
• Metrics are tracked, or the reason they could not be is stated.