Resources for CMS Monte Carlo Production
Adapted from my CERN TWiki
Important Tools
The Monte Carlo Management (McM) website is an incredibly useful tool. It can be used to view the status of current sample production, view work flows for previous samples, and find cmsdriver commands. It is also used by the generator contact in each Physics Analysis Group (PAG) to request the production of new Monte Carlo samples.
The production Monitoring platform (pMp) website displays the status of Monte Carlo samples that are currently being produced.
Tutorials
Hands-on Advanced Tutorial Sessions (HATS) at the LPC are great learning resource. The generator HATS is especially great, it teaches the basics of using Pythia via cmsdriver, reading particle decay chains, using McM, and using tools for calculating cross sections. Below are links to the indico page and the twiki page. The twiki page has detailed exercises that are nice to work through. There is also a recording, which I will add a link to when it is uploaded.
The McM and pMp tutorial by CMS Generators is another useful resource. It has a good overview on how to use McM and pMp. This tutorial also contains some advanced material that is meant for use only by PAG Gen contacts, but the advanced parts are easily skipped. The indico page is below.
Other Resources
For an example of producing private Monte Carlo samples, please see StandAloneMonteCarloGeneration
For information about producing Gridpacks with MadGraph, please see MadGraphGuide
For documentation on Pythia and MadGraph, use the links below.