Most programs on Casper and Cheyenne are designed to run in the terminal, but a few either require the use of a graphical interface or work best in one. While using the default method – X-forwarding – is sufficient for simple programs like text editors, it can be prohibitively slow for more complex programs like MATLAB, IDL, VAPOR, and RStudio.
When you log on to your workstation, you typically interact with programs using a graphical desktop shell. With virtual network computing (VNC), you can use a graphical desktop shell to work remotely on the Casper data analysis and visualization cluster.
The remote desktop runs on Casper in a VNC session that is managed by the VNC server. You access it with a VNC client, which runs on your local workstation.
To get startedDownload and install a VNC client on your local machine. CISL recommends the TigerVNC client and provides this video to help Mac users install it: Installing TigerVNC on a Mac laptop. (Installing on Windows machines is less complex.) TurboVNC also works, but systems using Java versions >8 do not include the necessary runtime libraries to enable TurboVNC's VNC viewer. Some other VNC clients – RealVNC, for example – do not work well with the VNC software installed on Casper. |
Connecting to a VNC sessionTo begin using a remote desktop with VNC, you will need to start a VNC session. Your session will run within a Casper job and can persist for up to 24 hours. These basic steps for starting a session are described in detail below:
If you are connected to the NCAR Internal Network or using the NCAR VPN, you will be able to connect directly to your session on the Casper batch node using the VNC client. If you are not on the NCAR network or VPN, you will need to create an SSH tunnel to connect your local machine and remote desktop. How to create the SSH tunnel is described below. Overview of the vncmgr scriptCISL provides the vncmgr script for initiating and managing VNC sessions on Casper. How to run it is described in detail in the following section. It can be used in interactive mode or command-line mode. Interactive mode: If you run the script without any command-line arguments, it will launch in the interactive mode. In this mode, you can start a new session, list existing sessions, query a session to retrieve connection instructions and obtain a new one-time-password, and kill a running session. The script enables you to name your session, state how long you want the server to run, and select which desktop shell to use (GNOME2, GNOME3, or KDE). It also allows for custom requests to both the job scheduler and the VNC server program. Command-line mode: In command-line mode, you specify a subcommand and provide any desired options as command line arguments. Here are the available commands:
Choosing a name (SESSION) is optional. If you do not provide a name, the name “default” will be assigned and referenced in each subcommand. Customizing the Casper job and VNC serverThe vncmgr script allows you to customize both the Casper session in which the server will run and the server itself. This customization can be done in both interactive and command-line modes. The most common uses involve increasing the resources allocated to your job. For example, you could allocate 4 CPUs and 20 GB of memory to a 2-hour VNC session using the command-line mode as follows: PBS syntax (in effect 3/29/2021)
You do not need to specify GPU resources, as all VNC jobs are automatically placed on nodes with NVIDIA Quadro GP100 GPUs. Run vncmgr --help in a Cheyenne or Casper login session for more information about using the script and customizing your session. Running vncmgr from your local machineYou can run the vncmgr command directly from your local machine as shown in the example below without first starting a login session on Cheyenne or Casper. While both command-line and interactive mode will work, CISL recommends interactive mode as it will allow you to generate new one-time passwords via the query option without having to authenticate to Cheyenne every time. Example This demonstrates how to run vncmgr, create and configure a customized VNC session, and then connect to the session with a VNC client. In this example, the user is not connected to the NCAR VPN and needs to use an SSH tunnel. (Alternative for PuTTY users.)
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