Policy Overview

To review the rubric that HPC Administrators will utilize in the approval evaluation, please visit the associated link. If you have questions or to submit requests for increased storage, submit an HPC Support Ticket. (Updated by the HPC Admins Team on 4/21/2026)

Purpose

This policy defines the criteria and process for granting additional storage on the BeoShock High-Performance Computing (HPC) system at Wichita State University (WSU). The goal is to ensure fair, efficient, and sustainable use of shared storage resources in support of research and instruction.

Scope

This policy applies to all BeoShock users, including faculty, staff, graduate students, and undergraduate students affiliated with Wichita State University.

Eligibility

Requests for storage beyond the standard allocation may be submitted by:

  • WSU faculty or staff members, or

  • Graduate and undergraduate students with approval from a WSU faculty/staff advisor or principal investigator (PI)

All requests must support active academic research, scholarly activity, or instructional use on BeoShock.

Acceptable User of Additional Storage

Additional storage allocations are intended for data that:

  • Is actively used in BeoShock workflows
  • Requires high-performance access for computation or analysis

Examples of appropriate use include:

  • Large-scale simulation or parameter-scan outputs
  • Experimental, detector, or observational datasets
  • Machine learning or data-intensive computing workloads
  • Multi-user or collaborative research projects

Additional storage may not be used for:

  • Personal data or unrelated backups
  • Long-term (1 year+) storage of inactive or archival data
  • Data that could reasonably be stored outside the HPC environment without impacting performance

Request Requirements

Requests for additional storage must include:

  1. A brief description of the project, course, or research activity
  2. The type and estimated size of data requiring storage
  3. The amount of additional storage requested
  4. The expected duration of need
  5. A short data management plan, including cleanup or archiving intentions
  6. Faculty/Staff advisor or PI approval for student requests

Incomplete requests may be returned for revision.

Review and Approval Criteria

Requests are evaluated based on:

  • Demonstrated research or instructional need
  • Responsible data management practices
  • Prior compliance with BeoShock usage policies
  • Impact on shared system resources
  • Alignment with WSU research and instructional priorities (when applicable)

Approval is contingent on storage availability and administrative discretion.

Allocation Limits and Duration

  • Additional storage is granted proportionally to demonstrated need
  • Large allocations may be approved incrementally
  • Allocations will be time-limited (12 months) and subject to renewal
  • Requests for an exception to the time-limit can be made (e.g. grant work exceeds 12-month limit) and will require documentation/justifications prior to approval
  • BeoShock administrators reserve the right to reclaim unused or abandoned storage

For student users, allocations may be tied to the advisor’s or PI’s project space and may be revoked upon graduation or departure from WSU.

Compliance and Enforcement

Users are responsible for:

  • Adhering to BeoShock policies
  • Periodically reviewing and removing obsolete data
  • Using scratch and project storage appropriately

Failure to comply with storage policies may result in:

  • Reduction or removal of additional storage
  • Restrictions on future storage requests

Policy Review

This policy may be reviewed and updated periodically to reflect changes in system capacity, usage patterns, or institutional priorities.