Skip to content

OpenFOAM

OpenFOAM is an open-source toolbox for computational fluid dynamics. OpenFOAM consists of generic tools to simulate complex physics for a variety of fields of interest, from fluid flows involving chemical reactions, turbulence and heat transfer, to solid dynamics, electromagnetism and the pricing of financial options.

The core technology of OpenFOAM is a flexible set of modules written in C++. These are used to build solvers and utilities to perform pre-processing and post-processing tasks ranging from simple data manipulation to visualisation and mesh processing.

There are a number of different flavours of the OpenFOAM package with slightly different histories, and slightly different features. The two most common are distributed by openfoam.org and openfoam.com.

Using OpenFOAM on ARCHER2

OpenFOAM is released under a GPL v3 license and is freely available to all users on ARCHER2.

auser@ln01> module avail openfoam
--------------- /work/y07/shared/archer2-lmod/apps/core -----------------
openfoam/com/v2106        openfoam/org/v9.20210903
openfoam/com/v2212 (D)    openfoam/org/v10.20230119 (D)

Note: the older versions were recompiled under PE22.12 in April 2023.

auser@ln01> module avail openfoam
--------------- /work/y07/shared/archer2-lmod/apps/core -----------------
openfoam/com/v2106          openfoam/org/v9.20210903 (D)
openfoam/org/v8.20200901

Versions from openfoam.org are typically v8.0 etc and there is typically one release per year (in June; with a patch release in September). Versions from openfoam.com are e.g., v2106 (to be read as 2021 June) and there are typically two releases a year (one in June, and one in December).

To use OpenFOAM on ARCHER2 you should first load an OpenFOAM module, e.g.

user@ln01:> module load PrgEnv-gnu
user@ln01:> module load openfoam/com/v2106

(Note that the openfoam module will automatically load PrgEnv-gnu if it is not already active.) The module defines only the base installation directory via the environment variable FOAM_INSTALL_DIR. After loading the module you need to source the etc/bashrc file provided by OpenFOAM, e.g.

source ${FOAM_INSTALL_DIR}/etc/bashrc

You should then be able to use OpenFOAM. The above commands will also need to be added to any job/batch submission scripts you want to use to run OpenFOAM. Note that all the centrally installed versions of OpenFOAM are compiled under PrgEnv-gnu.

Note there are no default module versions specified. It is recommended to use a fully qualified module name (with the exact version, as in the example above).

Running parallel OpenFOAM jobs

While it is possible to run limited OpenFOAM pre-processing and post-processing activities on the front end, we request all significant work is submitted to the queue system. Please remember that the front end is a shared resource.

A typical SLURM job submission script for OpenFOAM is given here. This would request 4 nodes to run with 128 MPI tasks per node (a total of 512 MPI tasks). Each MPI task is allocated one core (--cpus-per-task=1).

#!/bin/bash

#SBATCH --nodes=4
#SBATCH --tasks-per-node=128
#SBATCH --cpus-per-task=1
#SBATCH --distribution=block:block
#SBATCH --hint=nomultithread
#SBATCH --time=00:10:00

#SBATCH --partition=standard
#SBATCH --qos=standard

# Ensure the cpus-per-task option is propagated to srun commands
export SRUN_CPUS_PER_TASK=$SLURM_CPUS_PER_TASK

# Load the appropriate module and source the OpenFOAM bashrc file

module load openfoam/org/v10.20230119

source ${FOAM_INSTALL_DIR}/etc/bashrc

# Run OpenFOAM work, e.g.,

srun interFoam -parallel

#!/bin/bash

#SBATCH --nodes=4
#SBATCH --tasks-per-node=128
#SBATCH --cpus-per-task=1
#SBATCH --distribution=block:block
#SBATCH --hint=nomultithread
#SBATCH --time=00:10:00

# Replace [budget code] below with your project code (e.g. t01)
#SBATCH --account=[budget code]
#SBATCH --partition=standard
#SBATCH --qos=standard

# Load the appropriate module and source the OpenFOAM bashrc file

module load openfoam/org/v8.20210901

source ${FOAM_INSTALL_DIR}/etc/bashrc

# Run OpenFOAM work, e.g.,

srun interFoam -parallel

Compiling OpenFOAM

If you want to compile your own version of OpenFOAM, instructions are available for ARCHER2 at:

Extensions to OpenFOAM

Many packages extend the central OpenFOAM functionality in some way. However, there is no completely standardised way in which this works. Some packages assume they have write access to the main OpenFOAM installation. If this is the case, you must install your own version before continuing. This can be done on an individual basis, or a per-project basis using the project shared directories.

Module version history

The following centrally installed versions are available.

Upgrade 2023

Full system

  • Module openfoam/com/v2106 installed October 2021 (Cray PE 21.04). Version v2106 (June 2021). See OpenFOAM.com website

  • Module openfoam/org/v9.20200903 installed October 2021 (Cray PE 21.09). Version 9 patch release 3rd September 2021. See OpenFOAM.org website

  • Module openfoam/org/v8.20200901 installed October 2021 (Cray PE 21.09). Version 8 patch release 1st September 2020. See OpenFOAM.org website