Introduction
As part of my continuous technical exploration in the field of High-Performance Computing (HPC), I have embarked on a personal initiative to design, build, and operate a simulated HPC cluster in a small-scale VPS environment. While I work professionally in the Microsoft Azure HPC engineering team, this project serves both as a learning sandbox and a technical memorandum, documenting experiments, insights, and lessons learned through hands-on practice.
This article serves as the frontline post of a long-term series covering the entire process—from network design to deployment, scaling, monitoring, and automation. Future articles will be referenced here for easy navigation.
Project Overview
The primary goal of this project is not performance benchmarking, but rather architectural fidelity and operational realism. I aim to replicate the structure and behavior of an HPC cluster using minimal virtual resources, focusing on the interactions and integrations of key components.
Initial Environment
| Component | Description |
|---|---|
| OS | Rocky Linux 9.3 |
| Nodes | 3 VPS instances (management, compute, and storage) |
| Network | WireGuard-based full-mesh VPN |
| Architecture | Simulated HPC cluster (expandable) |
The cluster will initially consist of three nodes, but the design will allow gradual scaling to larger environments over time.
Technical Scope
Throughout this series, I will cover a variety of advanced HPC infrastructure topics, including but not limited to:
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Cluster Networking WireGuard VPN configuration for secure inter-node communication across public VPS providers.
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Distributed File Systems BeeGFS deployment and scaling from single-node to buddy-mirroring configurations.
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Job Scheduling & Management Slurm setup and tuning, Slurm HA configuration, and integration with Slurm REST API.
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Configuration Management Environment provisioning and maintenance using Ansible and Terraform.
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Monitoring and Observability Implementing job-level monitoring, system metrics collection, and performance dashboards (e.g., Prometheus, Grafana).
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Automation and Lifecycle Control Using Ansible playbooks and cron-based orchestration for consistent cluster management.
This hands-on series is meant to bridge the gap between theory and practice, providing a reference for those who wish to understand the internal mechanics of HPC clusters beyond managed cloud services.
Disclaimer
All configurations, parameters, and methods described in this series are specific to my own environment. They should not be applied blindly to production or enterprise systems without due validation and modification. Each VPS environment, provider, and network setup may behave differently.
Note: The author assumes no responsibility for system failures, data loss, or other damages resulting from replicating these configurations.
Table of Article Links
This section serves as the central hub for all posts in the Miniature HPC Cluster Series. Each article will be linked here as the series evolves.
| # | Title | Summary |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1. Designing a Full-Mesh VPN for cluster (WireGuard) | Establishing secure peer-to-peer communication among nodes over public VPS networks using WireGuard. |
| 2 | 2. Cluster Configuration Management with Ansible | Automating deployment, configuration, and updates with Ansible playbooks. |
| — | (More topics to follow…) | Future articles may include performance profiling, resource scheduling, and advanced automation. |
Closing Thoughts
In the world of HPC, hands-on experimentation remains the most effective teacher. Even in a constrained VPS environment, we can gain a deep understanding of distributed system design, failure tolerance, and automation.
If you are interested in learning HPC architecture from the ground up—layer by layer—this series is for you.
“Build small. Learn deeply. Scale wisely.”
