Computing Facilities
The Department of Computer Science is located in the Gould-Simpson Science Building where we maintain a variety of research and instructional facilities for CS student and faculty use.
There are four CS computing laboratories within Gould-Simpson: A combined graphics and general instructional Lab in GS 930 (a 33-station Intel i7 based Linux PC facility with high resolution LCD monitors), a general Instructional Lab in GS 228 (a 31-station Apple 21.5" iMac facility), and two Research Labs (in GS 748 and 915). There are also project, conference, and discussion rooms available on the 7th and 9th floors. The department strives to maintain a three year replacement cycle on all instructional computing equipment.
Access to student computing labs is made available via electronic keycard or cipher lock seven days a week, 24 hours per day. All CS computing labs are located in the Gould-Simpson Science Building as are our faculty, lab support staff, academic support services, and financial and administrative services.
Students receive accounts on our main timesharing machine, lectura (running Linux). All computers have access to gigabit ethernet and direct Internet connectivity. A 48TB Network Appliance and a 24TB Sun Fire X4540 file server provide shared data access across systems.
Preceptors hold consulting hours and demonstrations in the instructional labs. Department offices and instructional labs are equipped with redundant print stations and wireless access (802.11b/g). Students can use their personal laptops on the UA wireless networks in CS labs or lecture halls. Wired connections are also available to students in the GS228 lab. All CS students have access to our Commons Room in 737 with meeting area, library, and access to the Internet.
Our Research Labs offer a variety of equipment for use in student and faculty research projects. These labs contain Mac, Windows, and Linux OS systems, specialized printers, graphics and visualization devices, and a PC cluster. The 5-node Intel Core 2 Duo 'cy' cluster on switched gigabit ethernet is intended for computation-intensive projects.
In an effort to harness unused CPU power from otherwise idle desktop workstations, the department offers CSGrid. Using the University of Wisconsin Condor software, workstations within the department are made available for remote batch computing. CSGrid currently has 64 nodes. Spare computing cycles from the CSGrid have been used to solve complex computational problems of the Human Origins Genotyping Laboratory at The University of Arizona as well as in CS.
Additional information about Condor on the CS department machines
is available at: Condor On CSc Computing Facilities.
CS majors retain their accounts and access to lab facilities throughout their course of study. Graduating CS majors are offered continuing alumni accounts with email forwarding.
CS students, faculty, and staff receive University computing and email accounts through University Information Technology Services (UITS). UITS maintains the main campus communications backbone and our external Internet and Internet2 connectivity.
UITS offers a variety of computing facilities which complement Computer Science resources. In addition to student computing labs distributed across campus, UITS's High Performance Computing Center (HPC) provides campus access to several central computing systems available for research computing.
For individuals requiring more computing power than the CSGrid provides, UITS's HPC Center sponsors their own grid computing initiative, UAGrid, using the Condor software. UAGrid is designed to make available spare CPU cycles University-wide as an alternate computing resource.
Finally, UITS provides a state of the art Scientific Visualization Lab, AZ-LIVE, for campus use. AZ-LIVE is a room where university researchers, faculty, and students can be immersed in a three dimensional, computer generated world. The environment combines 3D computer graphics, stereoscopic projection technology, acoustical tracking devices, and four-channel audio to create the illusion of being present in a virtual world.
Last updated August 22, 2014
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