NAME

       lam-helpfile - LAM help message file

DESCRIPTION

       The  lam-helpfile  provides detailed error messages and suggestions for help on how to fix
       common problems.  In many places in LAM, when an error occurs, this help file is consulted
       to display a detailed message of what the error was and, when possible, suggestions on how
       to fix the problem.  It consists of much of the information from the LAM FAQ (particularly
       in dealing with getting LAM up and running)

       At  present, the following LAM tools use this help file (it is expected that more will use
       it in future releases.  If you have suggestions for locations where  more  detailed  error
       messages would be helpful, please let us know):

       hboot
       lamboot
       lamexec
       lamhalt
       lamnodes
       lamwipe
       mpicc (hcc)
       mpiCC (hcp)
       mpif77 (hf77)
       mpirun
       recon
       tkill
       tping

STRUCTURE AND SYNTAX

       The  help  file  is multiple blocks of help text separated by single line delimiters.  The
       delimiter lines are of the format:

       -*-programname:topicname-*-

       Where programname is the general name of the program (or group of programs) that this help
       message applies to, and topicname is the specific topic that this message applies two.

       The  special  keyword  ALL can be used for either the programname or the topicname in some
       cases; this is usually a "wildcard" value where  little specific information is available.

       Within the block of the message, lines that begin with a "#" are treated as comments; they
       are not printed out.

       Three special escape sequences can be used within the help message:

       %N     Where  N  is  a  number  from 1 to the number of arguments that the help message is
              invoked with.  The "%N" string is replaced with the value of the Nth argument  from
              the argument list.  The arguments are passed from the LAM binaries themselves; they
              cannot be edited.  The comments in the default  LAM  help  file  explain  how  many
              arguments each message is invoked with, and what each argument is.

       %perror
              Shows the result of the Unix perror(3) function.

       %terror
              Shows  the  result  of  the  LAM  terror() function, which is essentially a wrapper
              around the Unix perror(3) function.

LOCATION OF HELP FILE

       The exact location of the help file is configurable.  This  allows  system  administrators
       and/or users to customize the help file for their particular environment.

       When LAM attempts to print an error message from the help file, it looks for the help file
       in the following locations (in order):

       $HOME/lam-helpfile
       $HOME/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
       $HOME/etc/lam-helpfile
       $HOME/etc/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
       $LAMHELPDIR/lam-helpfile
       $LAMHELPDIR/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
       $LAMHOME/etc/lam-helpfile
       $LAMHOME/etc/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
       $TROLLIUSHOME/etc/lam-helpfile
       $TROLLIUSHOME/etc/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
       $SYSCONFDIR/lam-helpfile
       $SYSCONFDIR/lam-7.1.4-helpfile

       Note the variable $LAMHELPDIR; this  variable  can  be  set  according  to  platform,  for
       example,  to  provide  operating  system-specific  information, or information specific to
       particular groups of machines, etc.  It can also  be  set  to  provide  help  messages  in
       different languages.

       $SYSCONFIDIR  is  typically  $prefix/etc,  where  $prefix is the location to where LAM was
       installed;  it  was  the  option  supplied  to  ./configure  when  LAM   was   built   (or
       /usr/local/lam-7.1.4,  by  default).   However,  note that the value of $SYSCONFDIR can be
       overridden when LAM is configured with the --sysconfdir switch.

EXAMPLES

       The following is an example customization of the help for the hboot and lamboot  programs,
       when the user supplies a host file name that is not found.

       -*-boot:open-hostfile-*-
       %1 could not open the hostfile "%2" for the following reason:

                   %perror
       Things to check:

                   - ensure that the file exists
                     try "ls -l %2"
                   - ensure that you have read permissions on the file
                     try "cat %2"

       You may not need to specify a host file at all; the system
       administrators have defined the all of Beowulf cluster host names in
       the LAM default host name list.  If you wish to use all of the Beowulf
       nodes, simply execute:

                   %1 -v

       If you have any problems with LAM, please send mail to:

                   lam-admin@your.domain.com

FILES

       $LAMHOME/etc/lam-7.1.4-helpfile
           default LAM help file

SEE ALSO

       hboot(1), lamboot(1), lamexec(1), lamhalt(1), lamnodes(1), lamwipe(1), mpicc(1), mpiCC(1),
       mpif77(1), mpirun(1), recon(1), tkill(1), tping(1), perror(3)