DRMAAtic: dramatically improve your cluster potential.

Abstract

Motivation: The accessibility and usability of high-performance computing (HPC) resources remain significant challenges in bioinformatics, particularly for researchers lacking extensive technical expertise. While Distributed Resource Managers (DRMs) optimize resource utilization, the complexities of interfacing with these systems often hinder broader adoption. DRMAAtic addresses these challenges by integrating the Distributed Resource Management Application API (DRMAA) with a user-friendly RESTful interface, simplifying job management across diverse HPC environments. This framework empowers researchers to submit, monitor, and retrieve computational jobs securely and efficiently, without requiring deep knowledge of underlying cluster configurations.

Results: We present DRMAAtic, a flexible and scalable tool that bridges the gap between web interfaces and HPC infrastructures. Built on the Django REST Framework, DRMAAtic supports seamless job submission and management via HTTP calls. Its modular architecture enables integration with any DRM supporting DRMAA APIs and offers robust features such as role-based access control, throttling mechanisms, and dependency management. Successful applications of DRMAAtic include the RING web server for protein structure analysis, the CAID Prediction Portal for disorder and binding predictions, and the Protein Ensemble Database deposition server. These deployments demonstrate DRMAAtic's potential to enhance computational workflows, improve resource efficiency, and facilitate open science in life sciences.

Availability and implementation: https://github.com/BioComputingUP/DRMAAtic, https://drmaatic.biocomputingup.it/.