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- Quick Links:
- Edu POD Course/Account Management interface:
- https://rctf-account-request.icmb.utexas.edu/edu-pod/
- accessible only from the UT campus network or with the UT VPN service active
- Edu POD virtual host: edupod.cns.utexas.edu
- e.g. https://edupod.cns.utexas.edu for the RStudio and JupyterHub server web applications
- About R Studio Server & Troubleshooting common problems: About R and R Studio Server
- BRCF support email: rctf-support@utexas.edu
- Edu POD Course/Account Management interface:
- Important Notes:
- All account EIDs must be entered in lowercase when logging in, either by SSH or to the RStudio/JupyterHub web applications.
- Please let your students know to enter their EIDs using all lowercase letters.
- EDU pod accounts are deactivated a few weeks after each semester ends.
- Please let your students know this so they can ensure any files they want to retain in their Home directories are transferred elsewhere.
- All account EIDs must be entered in lowercase when logging in, either by SSH or to the RStudio/JupyterHub web applications.
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The Admin, Instructors and TAs have sudo access on the Edu POD, and will have access to the Class Management web application (https://rctf-account-request.icmb.utexas.edu/edu-pod/ accessible only from the UT campus network or with the UT VPN service active). Students will not have access to the Class management application.
Class/semester groups
Courses have a class designation (e.g. Bio369i) and a semester (e.g. Fall 2018). POD administration policies revolve around these class and class/semester concepts.
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In addition to the Admin, Instructors and TAs also have sudo access on the Edu POD, but should use it sparingly; for example, to look into student Home directories which have 700 permissions (user access only).
sudo should not be used for any of the following, as these are functions performed by the BRCF automated deployment system:
- Installing software that requires sudo
- Contact us at rctf-support@utexas.edu to request installation of any software requiring sudo.
- Creating or modifying user accounts or groups
- Changing permissions on top-level directories in Home, Work and Scratch
- Any such changes will be reverted by the deployment system
Class/semester groups
Courses have a class designation (e.g. Bio369i)
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and a semester (e.g. Fall 2018). POD administration policies revolve around these class and class/semester concepts.
- Each class has an associated class Unix group (e.g. Bio369i)
- Each class/semester combination also has an associated Unix group (e.g. Bio369i_Fall2018)
- Users associated with a class/semester are assigned to both the class and class/semester Unix groups
- the class/semester Unix group will be their primary group by default
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SSH access from outside the UT campus network requires either the use of UT VPN service, or public key encryption as described at Passwordless Access via SSH.
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Samba access is available from UT campus network addresses or from outside of UT using the UT VPN service.
For Mac users, the Samba URL for mounting EDU pod storage is:
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Maintenance windows will still be scheduled during which time POD resources will not be available. Dates for maintenance are posted in advance on the BRCF Users wiki home page. We generally schedule maintenance one day per month, the day and time designed to interfere with the fewest classes/labs. Instructors may request variances from the posted dates/times, and these will be honored to the extent possible.
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This is a separate account management from the standard BRCF account management UI. Like the standard BRCF web application, the EUD POD course management application is accessible only from the UT campus network or with the UT VPN service active.
See https://rctf-account-request.icmb.utexas.edu/edu-pod/operational-information/ for usage information.
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If the user account is not in the list of known users (https://rctf-account-request.icmb.utexas.edu/edu-pod/wp-admin/edit.php?post_type=edupod_user), the Add New Account page (https://rctf-account-request.icmb.utexas.edu/edu-pod/wp-admin/post-new.php?post_type=edupod_user) can be used to add EID accounts to the system, just by typing in the EID then Publishing the information.
Account information maintained for Edu POD accounts includes:
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Once the account is in the system, either the Edit Edu Account page or the Edit Edu Course interface can be used to add student(s) to a course.
File Management
File system/storage overview
To review (see File System Organization and Data/Account Retention)
- Home directories under /stor/home:
- Are only accessible by the account owner (and by the root superuser account)
- Are the current directory when a user logs in via SSH or accesses the RStudio or JupyterHub server web applications
- Are meant for student-specific work
- Do not have quotas
- Do have snapshots enabled (copy-on-write when files change)
- Are also fully backed up weekly
- Are archived to tape at TACC once a semester is over and the course is administratively closed
- and are removed from the file system (along with associated student accounts)
- Course/Semester and Course directories under /stor/work:
- Are accessible to all accounts in the specified Course and Course/Semester
- Are meant for course-specific files (e.g. homework assignments and associated data)
- Do not have quotas or snapshots
- Are fully backed up weekly
- Are archived to tape at TACC once a semester is over and the course is administratively closed
- but are not removed from the file system
- Course/Semester and Course directories under /stor/scratch:
- Similar to Work area directories in #2 above, but are not backed up
- Are meant for storing large data files that do not need to be backed up
Managing assignment files
There are a number of options for managing homework assignment files, for example:
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Account information maintained for Edu POD accounts includes:
- UT EID (required)
- First andLast Name
- Role (Instructor, TA, Student) (required)
Once the account is in the system, either the Edit Edu Account page or the Edit Edu Course interface can be used to add student(s) to a course.
File Management
File system/storage overview
To review (see File System Organization and Data/Account Retention)
- Home directories under /stor/home:
- Are only accessible by the account owner (and by the root superuser account)
- Are the current directory when a user logs in via SSH or accesses the RStudio or JupyterHub server web applications
- Are meant for student-specific work
- Do not have quotas
- Do have snapshots enabled (copy-on-write when files change)
- Are also fully backed up weekly
- Are archived to tape at TACC once a semester is over and the course is administratively closed
- and are removed from the file system (along with associated student accounts)
- Course/Semester and Course directories under /stor/work:
- Are accessible to all accounts in the specified Course and Course/Semester
- Are meant for course-specific files (e.g. homework assignments and associated data)
- Do not have quotas or snapshots
- Are fully backed up weekly
- Are archived to tape at TACC once a semester is over and the course is administratively closed
- but are not removed from the file system
- Course/Semester and Course directories under /stor/scratch:
- Similar to Work area directories in #2 above, but are not backed up
- Are meant for storing large data files that do not need to be backed up
Managing assignment files
There are a number of options for managing homework assignment files, for example:
- Post assignments to Canvas. Have students download to their personal computers, then Upload to their Home directory in RStudio Server. When complete, the students can either copy the files from their EDU pod Home directory back to their computer using Desktop file system access via Samba to mount their Home directory, then upload the completed assignment to Canvas from there.
Instructors can post assignments to their shared /stor/work/<Course_Semester> directory in a number of ways, as describe in the next Posting assignments to the shared course directory section below. After posting an assignment, instructors can have students copy it to their Home directory using a Terminal pane in RStudio Server, renaming it. When finished, use an RStudio Server Terminal pane to copy back to the shared /stor/work/<Course_Semester> directory.
Code Block language bash # Copy/rename homework assignment to user home directory, # which is the default current directory in an RStudio Terminal window. cp /stor/work/MOL290C_Fall2021/homework1.R homework1.amb599.R # When complete, copy the finished assignment back to the shared course/semester directory # Note the -p option ensures the file's date/time stamp is preserved cp -p homework1.amb599.R /stor/work/MOL290C_Fall2021/
Posting assignments to the shared course directory
Upload assignment files can be done in several ways:
- Use Desktop file system access via Samba to mount your Home directory, then drag/drop files from your computer using its file system browser.
- Use a remote file transfer command line utility such as scp, to copy files from your computer. The scp command-line program is available on Mac computers in the Terminal application, and on Windows computers in both Command Prompt and Windows PowerShell applications. A graphical remote file transfer program can also be used, such as WinSCP on Windows or Cyberduck on Macs.
Using one of these methods, instructors can stage files in the shared /stor/work/<Course_Semester> directory
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in either one or two steps.
The two-step process involves first transferring the files to your Home directory using one of the methods described below, then copying the files from there to the shared /stor/work/<Course_Semester> directory
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| language | bash |
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using an RStudio Server Terminal pane. For example, in a Terminal pane. For example, if your course is MOL290C_Fall2021:
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cp -p ~/homework1.R /stor/work/MOL290C_Fall2021/ |
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Posting assignments to the shared course directory
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In the one-step process, you first create a symbolic link to your shared /stor/work/<Course_Semester> directory in your Home directory, then use that as part of the destination path when uploading files to your Home directory. Such a symbolic link can be created, for example, in a Terminal pane:
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# Change to your Home directory, then create a symbolic link called "MOL290C_Fall2021"
cd
ln -s -f /stor/work/MOL290C_Fall2021 |