Accessing the IDEA Cluster (Jan 2021)

• The Rensselaer IDEA Compute Cluster provides five compute nodes (4x 48 cores, 1x 80 cores, 1x storage server)
  • RCS credentials required
    • email John Erickson for access: erickj4@rpi.edu
    • Students of IDEA-sponsored courses (e.g. MATP-4400, MATP-4900) are automatically added for the term of the course
  • The Cluster provides access to: RStudio, Jupyter, Python, MATLAB, GPUs (on Nodes 2 and 5); lots of storage and computes
  • Access via the RPI physical network or VPN required
  • Priority is given to IDEA researchers and students in IDEA-sponsored courses (e.g. MATP-4910, MATP-4400)
• GUI (Web) links:
  • http://lp01.idea.rpi.edu/rstudio-ose/  or http://lp01.idea.rpi.edu/rstudio-ose-3/ (RStudio Server)
  • http://lp01.idea.rpi.edu/jupyter/ or https://lp01.idea.rpi.edu/jupyter-gpu/
  • GUI access to MATLAB possible via port forwarding; command line recommended! (Contact John Erickson)
  • Linux terminal accessible from within RStudio "Terminal" or via ssh (below)
• Shared Data on Cluster:
  • All idea_users have access to shared storage via /data ("data" in your home directories)
  • Permissions are best managed via the Linux terminal (see above)
• Shell access to individual nodes: You must access "landing pad" first, then a specific compute node:
  • ssh your_rcs@lp01.idea.rpi.edu, then ssh idea-node-XX
  • For example:
    1. ssh erickj4@lp01.idea.rpi.edu
    2. Then, ssh idea-node-02 (to access "Node 02," a GPU node)

Help for IDEA Cluster Python Users

• See: Working with Python3 on the IDEA Cluster (pdf) (revised Feb 2021)

Contact John Erickson for details! erickj4@rpi.edu