Getting Started

KiT-RT has two user-facing layers:

Which tool should I use?

User goal	Use this	First command
Run one deterministic solver config	kitrt_code	./build_omp/KiT-RT examples/configs/smoke_test.cfg
Run parameter sweeps	CharmKiT	charm-kit run lattice --singularity
Submit SLURM sweeps	CharmKiT plus site slurm_template.sh	charm-kit submit lattice --cuda
Extend solver internals	kitrt_code	See Developer Guide

Ten-minute CPU path

Run these commands from a fresh clone on a machine with the required CPU dependencies installed. See Installation for BLAS/LAPACK, VTK, and Python package requirements.

git clone https://github.com/KiT-RT/kitrt_code.git
cd kitrt_code
git submodule update --init --recursive
cmake -S . -B build_omp -DCMAKE_BUILD_TYPE=Release -DBUILD_MPI=OFF -DBUILD_CUDA_HPC=OFF -DBUILD_ML=OFF
cmake --build build_omp -j
./build_omp/KiT-RT examples/configs/smoke_test.cfg
python tools/check_smoke_output.py examples/result/smoke_test

Expected result: the checker prints PASS and the output directory contains a CSV log plus VTK/VTU volume output. See Smoke Test for details.

Container path

Container definitions live under tools/singularity. Apptainer is supported through KITRT_CONTAINER_RUNTIME=apptainer; Singularity remains supported through KITRT_CONTAINER_RUNTIME=singularity. A local CPU image can be built with:

cd tools/singularity
KITRT_CONTAINER_RUNTIME=apptainer ./build_container.sh cpu

If your site does not permit local SIF builds, use a site-provided image or a remote pull URI instead of building containers on the cluster login node.