Install CUDA / cuDNN with Axii

In Axii, there are modules for CUDA/cuDNN under deps/cuda/. For example:

$ axii list --all | grep -i cuda
│   ├── cuda/
│   │   ├── cuda-10.1-cudnn-7.6: deps/cuda/cuda-10.1-cudnn-7.6
│   │   └── cuda-11.2-cudnn-8.1: deps/cuda/cuda-11.2-cudnn-8.1

Each module corresponds to the combination of a specific CUDA version and a specific cuDNN version.

Note: If you need another version, please just request it and it will be added accordingly.

You can add such a module just as any Axii module. For example, for CUDA 10.1 / cuDNN 7.6:

axii add deps/cuda/cuda-10.1-cudnn-7.6

Afterward, an axii upgrade will install the requested CUDA/cuDNN. For this to work though, Axii relies on the configuration variable cuda_cudnn_archives_path to point to a directory containing the downloaded archives and run scripts.

You should be prompted for a corresponding configuration by the CUDA module. On an H²T lab PC, for example, the following will configure Axii properly: axii config global cuda_cudnn_archives_path /common/share/archive/software/linux/cuda_cudnn. Otherwise, you can mount the H2T archive and supply the corresponding path <archive>/software/linux/cuda_cudnn.

You can also download the archives yourself from the NVIDIA website. The directory pointed to by axii config global cuda_cudnn_archives_path is expected to look like this:

$ ls $(axii config global cuda_cudnn_archives_path)
cuda_10.0.130_410.48_linux.run
cuda_10.1.105_418.39_linux.run
cuda_11.2.2_460.32.03_linux.run
cudnn-10.0-linux-x64-v7.4.1.5.tgz
cudnn-10.1-linux-x64-v7.6.5.32.tgz
cudnn-10.1-linux-x64-v8.0.4.30.tgz
cudnn-11.2-linux-x64-v8.1.1.33.tgz

Activate CUDA / cuDNN

Axii does not activate any installed CUDA/cuDNN version automatically (e.g. by exporting CUDA_HOME). This is required to allow you to use multiple versions in your workspace (e.g. for different projects).

Instead, Axii exports functions for activating and deactivating a specific CUDA/cuDNN combination into your workspace. For example:

activate_cuda_10_1_cudnn_7_6 # Enables CUDA 10.1 / cuDNN 7.6

deactivate_cuda_10_1_cudnn_7_6 # Disables CUDA 10.1 / cuDNN 7.6.

Only use a deactivate_cuda_* function after calling the corresponding activate_cuda_* function.

These functions export a number of environment variables, including CUDA_HOME, CUDA_TOOLKIT_ROOT_DIR, PATH and LD_LIBRARY_PATH.

The scripts defining these functions are located in Axii at deps/cuda/scripts/activate_cuda_*.

If you need to activate a CUDA/cuDNN to run a specific executable, you can create a proxy script which activates it and calls the executable. For example:

#! /bin/bash
 
activate_cuda_10_1_cudnn_7_6
 
./my_executable $@
 
deactivate_cuda_10_1_cudnn_7_6

Table of Contents

Install CUDA / cuDNN with Axii

Activate CUDA / cuDNN