EasyBuild

What is EasyBuild?

EasyBuild is a framework for building and installing software in a structured, repeatable and robust way. EasyBuild is written in Python.

It was developed by the High-Performance Computing team at Ghent University and was motivated by the need for a system that allows to:

• independently install multiple versions of a software application side-by-side
• support multiple compilers and libraries for building a software application and its dependencies
• keep the build specification simple
• divert from the standard configure / make / make install with custom procedures (which is often necessary for scientific applications)
• use environment modules for dependency resolution and for making the software available to users in a transparent way
• keep a record of the installation logs
• keep track of the build specifications in a version control system

Some key properties of EasyBuild:

• the build specification is described using a (very concise) easyconfig (an .eb file)
• the custom behaviour is described in easyblocks; these are Python modules that can be plugged into the EasyBuild framework
• modular support for compilers and accompanying libraries (MPI, linear algebra, etc.)
• fully automated generation of the module files to easily make the software available to users
• the dependencies are resolved using environment modules and can be automatically installed using the robot feature
• after the installation, the easyconfigs can be sent to a repository for archiving

For more information on EasyBuild, see the documentation wiki on github.