A cloud calculation can finish successfully and still leave you with a practical problem: where are its files, which run is it, and how do you get the results back into your molecular modeling workspace? When several jobs are underway—perhaps structure prediction alongside a molecular dynamics simulation—it is easy to lose track of what belongs to which task.
SAMSON’s Job Manager brings cloud jobs into one place. A useful way to work with it is to treat each job as a small, trackable record: identify it clearly, keep the relevant context with it, check its status, and retrieve its files when needed.
Start with a clear job record
Open the Job Manager from Interface > Job manager. Jobs launched from SAMSON by supported extensions appear there, and the manager can be used to execute cloud jobs—including starting, pausing, or stopping them—and monitor them.
Before moving on to another task, make the job easy to recognize. Select it to open its details, then edit its name and notes. Names and notes are automatically synced with your SAMSON Connect account, so this is also a useful place to preserve context that you may want to see later.
For example, use a name that distinguishes the calculation or system, and notes to record why you launched it or what you intend to inspect. This simple habit helps prevent a common source of wasted time: downloading the right files from the wrong run.
Check the job before retrieving files
When you return to a project, select the job and review its details. The manager is designed to help you monitor cloud jobs and bring results back into SAMSON. If you need to access the outputs, double-click the job to download all its files.
Downloading everything may be useful when you want a complete local copy of a run. If you only need to check what is available first, use the job’s context menu: it provides access to local files that have already been downloaded, remote files stored in the cloud, and the job’s view on SAMSON Connect. The distinction between local and remote files is helpful when you are trying to confirm whether a result is already on your computer or still needs to be retrieved.
Keep sharing separate from downloading
Retrieving files and sharing a job are related, but they solve different problems. The Job Manager helps you get the files into SAMSON; SAMSON Connect lets you view cloud jobs and control who has access to them. If a collaborator needs to inspect a run, check its sharing settings on SAMSON Connect rather than assuming that downloading the files also shares the job.
One practical routine is to name and annotate a job when you create or first review it, monitor it in the Job Manager, download its files when you need them locally, and use SAMSON Connect when access by others needs to be managed. This keeps the computational record, local results, and sharing decisions easier to distinguish.
Remember the credit requirement
Cloud calculations in SAMSON require Computing Credits. If you are planning a cloud workflow, check that requirement before launching the calculation. The documentation also describes a referral program for earning free Computing Credits.
Cloud computing does not remove the need to keep track of runs; it makes good organization more valuable. Clear names, useful notes, and a deliberate file-retrieval step can make it much easier to pick up a molecular modeling task after the calculation has run.
For details, see the SAMSON Cloud computations documentation.
Note: SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. Get SAMSON at www.samson-connect.net.