When should I run jobs out of /tmp/mydirectory?
The department network is configured such that all unix user files are on one machine. When you log into cantor, for example, the files that you see in your home directory are actually stored on a remote machine (ripoff). Normally ripoff is fast enough to handle network traffic, so much so that you probably don’t notice any delays. However, if you are running a job that is performing frequent reads and writes of file(s), or if the files you are working with are large, you are taxing both the network and ripoff. The result is a slower network and longer running times for your program. A better approach for these types of programs is to use the local temporary space on a machine. First, make a directory in /tmp (say /tmp/myname). Copy (cp) the relevant bits of your program and data to that directory, modifying any references to files in your home directory to /tmp/myname. Now, when you run the program from /tmp/myname, any reads and writes to files in that directory are local to the mach
