Overview

General information on how to initiate an interactive session, including requesting custom resources, and general information on X11 forwarding.

Interactive Session

Normally, compute nodes are only accessible to programs or jobs submitted as batch sbatch scripts to the scheduler. This mode of operation is ideal for well-understood research computing pipelines but may need to be approached more piecemeal through interactive sessions on compute nodes. This page documents how to obtain interactive shell sessions on compute nodes. Note that interactive graphical sessions are available through the OpenOnDemand Web PortalsPortal.

Once logged in, to launch an interactive compute session, simply run the following command:

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This will automatically use the X11-forwarding feature built into your shell (in the case of Linux). On MacOS and Windows, using X11 apps natively on your workstation desktop may require an X11 client (such as Xquartz or Cygwin/X. The setup and use of these applications are beyond the scope of this document.

We recommend using the Web Portal for better graphical sessions.

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Interactive Session Options

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For example, you can specify how many CPU cores you want your interactive session to use with the -c number option.

You can also specify how long you would like your session to run with the -t days-hours:minutes option.

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We also offer a series of workshops. More information here: Educational Opportunities and Workshops