Why won't my job start?

The whypending command shows some generic informatoin on why a job is pending:

whypending $jobid

If Slurm has assigned a start time for the job it will be at the bottom of the output:

The job is expected to start by 2017-11-03T11:47:22

Of course, it may not start at that time. Here are a few examples:

• Current jobs may terminate before their scheduled walltime, allowing you to run sooner.
• Another user with higher priority may submit new jobs before your start time, pushing your jobs back.
• Your job may backfill, allowing you to run sooner.

Your job may be held

If you see a reason of JobHeldUser or JobHeldAdmin then this job is in the held state. This may be because it was submitted with -H or --hold. It may also be because an administrator or account manager ran scontrol hold or scontrol uhold on your job. If the state is JobHeldAdmin then an ORC employee must release the job. If the state is JobHeldUser then you can release it with scontrol release $jobid.