Common Storage Migration

The existing storage system, installed in 2016 with a total capacity of 450 TB, has reached the end of its lifespan. It will be replaced by a modern, distributed storage solution spanning the five universities involved in the CÉCI project. The new system offers 1 PB of storage capacity and is built entirely with open-source technologies, with a focus on high availability and scalability.

Although we do our utmost to ensure that the transition to the new Common Storage is as smooth as possible, it’s impossible to do it without some disruption. If you are a user of the Common Storage, we invite you to read this page carefully to minimize the impact of the transition on your work.

Warning

  • Data from your CÉCI home and the CÉCI transfer space will not be transferred automatically to the new Common Storage.
  • Data from CÉCI Common Storage Project space will be transferred automatically to the new Common Storage. Therefore, there is no action required on your side for this storage.
  • There is no CÉCI transfer (/CECI/trsf) space on the new Common Storage.

Step 1: the current Common Storage will be read only

In preparation for the migration to the new Common Storage, all the data on the current CÉCI Common Storage will be set to read only mode. This means that any write operation on this storage will fail. This step will allow us to make the final copy of the home and projects directories stored on the old Common Storage.

This step will be effective on April 14th, 2025 at 2PM.

Therefore, from April 7th, 2025:

  • It is strongly recommended to not submit jobs using files stored on the CÉCI Common Storage.
  • You should backup any relevant data stored in the CÉCI transfer (/CECI/trsf). As CÉCI transfer is only intended for short-term storage, it will not be transferred to the new Common Storage or backed up. Any data stored there will be permanently deleted once the new Common Storage is in production.

Step 2: The current Common Storage will be replaced by the new one

The old Common Storage will be made unavailable and replaced by the new one. The consequences will be:

  • your new CÉCI home will be empty and available using the environment variable $CECIHOME.
  • data from your old CÉCI home will remain available read-only, using the environment variable $CECIHOMEOLD.

This step will be effective on April 22nd, 2025 at 2PM.

Therefore, on this date, you will be able to copy your data from your old CÉCI home ($CECIHOMEOLD) to your new CÉCI home ($CECIHOME).

Please copy only the data you still need for your work.

Data from your old CÉCI home will remain available until the end of May. We recommend that you do not delay the copy of any important file you may have in your old Common Storage home directory.

In addition, on this date, the CÉCI Common Storage Project space will be available in read/write on the following new location:

/CECI/proj/<university>/<project_name>

Warning

As previously indicated, there is no longer any transfer space (/CECI/trsf) on the new CÉCI Common Storage.

For further information, please consult the dedicated documentation page.