_{Updated 2022-11-30}

Acessing PACE Clusters

Can my non-GT collaborator access my cluster?

• Yes, your collaborator can access PACE with a GT guest account.
• The GT sponsor, most often a faculty member engaged in a collaboration, should create the guest account.
• Please visit Passport.
• Choose "Manage Guests" under "Sponsored Guests" and create a guest account for the external collaborator.
  • LAWN access is not required for a remote collaborator.
• Passport will assign a GT username to your guest.
• Please contact PACE to request that your guest be added to your PACE allocation. Be sure to include the guest's GT username.
• Guest accounts are valid for a limited duration. Please return to Passport to renew your guest's GT username before it expires if continued access is required.
• Your guest must set up two-factor authentication with Duo in order to access the GT VPN. Please ask your guest to visit Passport to self-enroll in two-factor authentication.
  • The GT VPN is required to access PACE clusters.
• If a researcher graduates or leaves GT and requires continued access to PACE, a guest account can be created for them. Upon request, PACE can transfer all data to the guest account for continued use of PACE resources.

What do you recommend for file transfer between my local machine and clusters?

Please refer to the File Transfer with Globus section. While Globus is recommended, you may use any of the methods found in the Storage and File Transfer section.

Can I access PACE clusters from off-campus when I am at home?

Yes, but you must use the GT VPN.

How do I access head and compute nodes?

• Head nodes are accessible via SSH. Make sure you have an active VPN connection first.
• Compute nodes are only accessible from other compute nodes and head nodes via either SSH or RSH. However, you will only be able to login to a given compute node if you have an active job running on that node. If the scheduler detects that your jobs on a given compute node have completed, any "leftover" or "derelict" processes left running on that compute node are subject to termination.
• RSH is a passwordless protocol, and should require no user action to work. If you encounter trouble using RSH, please contact PACE support.
• SSH encryption keys are normally created with your user account, and eliminate the need to supply a password when logging in via SSH from another node within the same cluster. You can issue the command ls -al ~/.ssh to see if you already have a preconfigured SSH. If that's not the case, follow the procedure below:
• Starting out with no .ssh directory, you can do the following (just hitting Return when ssh-keygen prompts you for a response):

[user@force ~]$ ssh-keygen -t rsa
Generating public/private rsa key pair.
Enter file in which to save the key (/nv/hp16/user/.ssh/id_rsa):
Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase):
Enter same passphrase again:
Your identification has been saved in /nv/hp16/user/.ssh/id_rsa.
Your public key has been saved in /nv/hp16/user/.ssh/id_rsa.pub.
The key fingerprint is:
86:f1:d7:54:f4:05:8e:d7:68:26:0b:47:16:86:2e:db user@joe.pace.gatech.edu

[user@force ~]$ cd ~/.ssh

[user@force .ssh]$ ls
id_rsa  id_rsa.pub

[user@force .ssh]$ cat id_rsa.pub >> authorized_keys2
      [user@force .ssh]$ ls
      id_rsa  id_rsa.pub   authorized_keys2

How do I use cluster GUI apps?

• Use Open OnDemand.