User Tools

Site Tools


other:newppl:starting

This is an old revision of the document!


Getting started in CLIM & ESTIMR

Welcome to the CLIM & ESTIMR teams!

You are probably reading this page because you are a new intern student, visitor, etc…
This page will help you survive your first steps at LSCE, at least survive the computers…

Reading this page will save your life (and a lot of time)!

Miscellaneous information

A few useful links that have nothing to do with science and software resources!

Phone directory, and map of the building

Using existing information

Updating the directory/map information

It's very important that you update your phone/office information when you arrive at LSCE, so that other people can find you using the tools above!

Finding your phone number

Use the following sequence of keys on the Mitel phone in your office:

  1. Select MENU (use the downward arrow)
  2. Select PARAMETRES (use the downward arrow)
  3. Select GENERAL (use the downward arrow)
  4. Select MON NUMERO
    • This will display your 2 + NNNN phone number
    • You can be called from outside with 01 69 08 NN NN

Updating your entry in the directory

  1. Find your name in the phone directory
  2. Click on Modifier mes coordonnées (in blue on the right side)
  3. Click on Informations dans l'annuaire and update the different fields
  4. Click on Envoyez votre demande

The LSCE mailing lists

It is important to join the correct mailing lists, if you want to get all the information you need, on time.

The 'all' list

When your account is created, your email address should automatically be added to the the all list, that can be used to send mails to all the people working at LSCE. You will also get IPSL information through this list

all@lsce.ipsl.fr Everybody at LSCE
lsce-orme@lsce.ipsl.fr People working at Orme
lsce-gif@lsce.ipsl.fr People working in Gif

Mails sent to these lists will reach lots of people. Think well before sending a mail to these lists!

The 'clim' and 'estimr' lists

Ask your team leader or Jean-Yves to add you to your team's mailing list

Notes

  • You have to be identified on the server to access most lists's details. Enter you login and email password in the email address and pasword fields at the top right of any mailing list web page
  • You may want/need to join other mailing lists (project specific, sports, …). Check the list of lists to find about all the existing lists
  • It is possible to use mails to interact with the LSCE lists server, rather than the web interface

Using your own computer at LSCE?

No need to try to connect your laptop to the LSCE wire network, it will not work!

The best you can do is use the eduroam or guest wifi network, if your office is close enough to one of the access points.

Warning! You can't connect directly to the obelix LSCE servers from the wifi network. You first have to connect to ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr, and then to obelix

Accessing the LSCE intranet

If you try to access the intranet from outside the LSCE network (including eduroam), your browser will open a login/password popup window. Use your LSCE login (not your email address!) and password

Intranet web site: https://intranet.lsce.ipsl.fr/

There is a lot of information available on the LSCE intranet, but you can only access it from a computer connected to the LSCE network

Everything about the LSCE servers (and other software and hardware information): https://intranet.lsce.ipsl.fr/informatique/en/orme/index.php

  • Reading the mails with the webmail or Thunderbird
    • As soon as you have a LSCE e-mail address, make sure it is added to the clim or estimr mailing list

Accessing the CEA Saclay intranet and other CEA web sites with vpnssl

It used to be possible to access the CEA Saclay intranet by just clicking on http://www-saclay.cea.fr/ from any computer on the LSCE network.

This is not possible anymore, now that LSCE is on the Paris-Saclay network (and not on the CEA network)

Use the following steps:

  1. Start Chrome (or try another browser)
  2. Open the following link: https://vpnssl.cea.fr/
    • ignore the security errors
    • this link will work from the Paris Saclay network, and ANY other location (e.g. home) OUTSIDE of CEA
  3. Use your initials and badge number as the login (e.g. “James Bond” ⇒ “jb007007”) and the number supplied by the activIDentity keyring, followed by your 4 digits personal code, as your password
  4. Select the CEA web site you want from the “Aventail WorkPlace” portal
    • Espace Sigma: that's where you specify when you will be on holidays
    • Intranet Saclay: where you can get information about the CEA buses, CEA directory, security training registration and information, practical information, etc…
    • Intranet du voyageur: if you need to make a plane/train reservation
  5. Click on logout when you are done

Setting up your desktop computer

Everybody working for CLIM & ESTIMR gets a computer that can be connected to the LSCE network. Please take the time to read the instructions below, that may help make your life easier

Windows computer

Read the Windows 10 notes, especially the Configuring Windows 10 section

Note: there are also some Windows 7 notes, but you are supposed to use Windows 10 since January 2020!

Getting administrator's rights


Make sure you know what you are doing and that you are not executing a virus asking you suspicious access rights!

If an application requests administrator's rights to install something or make changes to the computer, and you are sure it's not a virus, use the .\admin local account and the admin password you received when your computer was configured, or ask the system administrators.

Linux computer

There are different window managers available, each one with different settings: you should the Cinnamon window manager (xfce is a bit too basic, and Gnome is not very convenient for doing actual work, and uses too much CPU). You can select the window manager by clicking on the little cogwheel below the password field, on the login screen.

This is Linux, you are using it for work, you should be efficient, so you should be able to do most of your work by typing commands in a terminal. The true power is in the correct use of the command-line interfaces, rather than having to spend time finding where to click in the windows. You will find some Linux documentation below.

Using the root acount


Do not use the root account or privileges if you don't know exactly what you are doing!

Depending on what you need to do:

  • run a single command with the root access rights
    sudo command
  • become root in a terminal
    sudo su -
  • use the root password when a program asks for it. Be sure the programs have legitimate reasons to ask for the root password!

Mac

Sorry, you are on your own, but it's soooo easy to use, right?

Accessing the Windows cluster from a Linux computer

Follow the instructions in the Windows servers page. If you need to use a program that is missing on this cluster, see the Help section

Accessing the Linux servers from your LSCE deskop

Linux or mac desktop

Windows desktop

There should be an Obelix shortcut on the left side of your desktop. Double-click on it in order to open a window (e.g. with graphics) environment on one of the obelix servers. Each terminal you will open in this environment will run on the same obelix server. Use ssh to connect another server

If there is not yet an Obelix shortcut, use the VcXsrv XLaunch program to create it

Note: you can also use Putty if you just need text windows, or VcXsrv or Putty+Cygwin-X if you also need graphics

Which Linux servers should you use?

Working directly on your desktop

Always remember that your local LSCE desktop can access remote disks on the LSCE servers.

There are lots of things you can do directly on your local Windows 10 or Linux desktop (displaying pdf, images, using a text editor, …), rather than on the remote servers. For example, if a script running on the servers generates a pdf file, it is more efficient to open this pdf file using Acrobat/evince on your desktop, than by using evince on the server.

Available servers

  • The LSCE interactive servers: obelixNN. Use ssh obelix to access these servers, and the load balancing system will send you to the server that has currently the smallest load.
    Never forget that you are sharing these servers with other users! Do not use too much CPU and/or memory for a long time. Heavy computation should be done on the obelix cluster
    • $ ssh obelix
      Last login: Mon Jun  3 08:49:53 2019 from somewhere
      # You can use one of the following commands if you want to know on which obelix you are
      $ echo $HOST
      obelix5
      $ hostname
      obelix5
  • The LSCE cluster (aka the batch system). Use this for really heavy duty programs
  • The ciclad and climserv servers. In some cases, you may need an account to use the IPSL/ESPRI clusters, especially if you need to use data files that are already available/mirrored there (e.g. CMIPn data), rather than copying the data to LSCE
  • The asterixN servers: some wise LSCE elders may mention these servers, but they don't exist any more!

Which shell are you using?

It is important to know which shell you are using if you need to configure and tune your Linux account. The shell is basically the program that waits for you to type commands in a terminal and passes them to the computer

If you are not sure which shell is running in your terminals, you can use echo $SHELL to find out:

# Somewhere with tcsh
 > echo $SHELL
 /bin/tcsh

# Somewhere else with bash
 $ echo $SHELL
 /bin/bash

Determining the load of a Linux server

If the Linux server you are working on seems slow, or if you want to get an idea of the resources you are using, you should use the top command

jypeter@obelix4 - ...jypeter - 46 >top
top - 17:48:51 up 8 days, 23:43, 29 users,  load average: 1.22, 1.38, 1.98
Tasks: 324 total,   2 running, 320 sleeping,   2 stopped,   0 zombie
Cpu(s): 12.6%us,  0.0%sy,  0.0%ni, 87.4%id,  0.0%wa,  0.0%hi,  0.0%si,  0.0%st
Mem:  32877756k total, 14706188k used, 18171568k free,    21372k buffers
Swap: 33554428k total,  1628972k used, 31925456k free, 14105940k cached

  PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND
10193 mpeau     20   0  302m 4336 2272 R 100.0  0.0   7033:08 emacs
16504 mpeau     20   0  110m 2008 1228 S  0.7  0.0   0:00.13 tcsh
26344 dzhu      20   0 1635m  20m 3880 S  0.3  0.1   0:44.90 ipython
    1 root      20   0 21448 1108  892 S  0.0  0.0   0:01.61 init
    [...]

The top lines give you some summary information about the system, but you should monitor the memory usage (VIRT and RES), CPU and TIME columns. By default, top will will put the processes using the more CPU at the top (as shown above). You can see above that the emacs text editor has clearly crashed, because it should not use 100% CPU for such a long time

If you type M, the processes will be sorted my memory usage, as shown below

      PID USER      PR  NI  VIRT  RES  SHR S %CPU %MEM    TIME+  COMMAND
16092 jchang    20   0 8488m 8.1g 7912 R 99.6 25.9   1:41.38 idl
23256 pvait     20   0  232m  70m 2632 S  0.0  0.2   0:01.36 R
26344 dzhu      20   0 1635m  20m 3880 S  0.0  0.1   0:44.87 ipython
10619 astege    20   0  954m 9292 2664 S  0.0  0.0   0:40.67 gedit
 1362 nslcd     20   0  442m 6056 2208 S  0.0  0.0   2:13.98 nslcd
16238 twang     20   0  128m 5068 2076 S  0.0  0.0   0:00.05 gconfd-2
10193 mpeau     20   0  302m 4336 2272 R 99.9  0.0   7024:13 emacs
    [...]

Other useful keys:

q Quit
c Display the command line options of the running processes
u List only the processes of a specific user

Which disks should you use?

  • It is very important to use the correct directories and make it easy for your advisor to find things after you have left
    • Put the source codes, scripts and papers you are writing on a backed up disk
      • The backed up disk at LSCE is /home/users/your_login. You should have a few Gb available on home (use the quota -s command to find out the exact amount)
    • Put temporary files on a scratch disk (scratch01 at LSCE)
    • Do NOT put (big) data files on a backed up disk
  • Do not forget to clean your directories before you leave (ask your advisor what should be kept or cleaned)

Accessing remote disks

It is possible to access directly all the disks on the LSCE servers from your local Linux or Windows desktop

  • Example path on the LSCE Linux server: /home/scratch01/your_lsce_login
  • Accessing the path above from a local desktop:

The home directory

  • Location: the location depends on the machine you are connected to in the current terminal
    • On the LSCE servers (obelixN): /home/users/your_lsce_login
      • Non LSCE servers:
        • TGCC: /ccc/cont003/home/dsm/your_tgcc_login
          You can find out the location of all your directories with ccc_home -a (use ccc_home -h to find out all the available options)
        • ciclad: /home/your_ciclad_login
    • On a local Linux desktop (lsceNNNN): /homel/your_lsce_login
    • The configuration files of your Linux account are stored in the home directory (use ls -a to see hidden files and directories). Ask your advisor if you should copy somebody else's configuration files
      • tcsh shell users: .cshrc and .login
      • bash shell users: .profile and .bashrc
      • emacs text editor: .emacs
    • You can go to your home directory by typing cd (no arguments), and to the home directory of somebody else with cd ~login_name
    • At LSCE, you can't read the content of somebody else's home directory
  • Backup of the home directory on the LSCE servers: YES! Every night
    • More details on the LSCE backup system page
    • Put the most important sources/scripts/data/papers in this directory
    • Do not use the home directory to store:
      • temporary files (use scratch01)
      • big (or many) data files (use scratch01 or a project specific disk)
    • Your home directory will be archived when your account is closed, so that you or your advisor can access it later, if required
  • Backup of the TGCC home directory: YES!
    • Use the following command to access the backup: cd ~/.snapshot
  • Quota: YES!
    There is a limit to what you can store in your home directory. If you reach this limit, you may experience some seemingly random errors (can't connect to the servers, the new files have a 0 size, …)
    The example below shows how to determine the quota on the LSCE disks: you can never go above the size displayed in the limit column, and you cannot stay more than 7 days above the limit displayed in the quota column! The grace column will display either None (you cannot write on the disk anymore, unless you get below the quota limit) or N days (you can use the disk, but you have N days to go below the quota limit)
     > quota -s
    
    Disk quotas for user jypeter (uid 6369):
         Filesystem  blocks   quota   limit   grace   files   quota   limit   grace
    prolix3:/users/   4658M   4883M   4981M           23503       0       0

The scratch directory

Do not put anything in the scratch directory that you can't recreate with a program, or copy/download from somewhere else!
  • Location: /home/scratch01/your_lsce_login
  • Backup: NO
    • Use this directory for temporary and big data files
    • The files older than 6 months (and possibly older than 1 month) will be automatically deleted if there is not enough free space. See the Scratch area section for more details on the retention policy
      • In other words, the files are guaranteed to stay 1 month and possibly longer
  • Quota: NO

Project specific directories

The data on these disks is probably not backed up… You are not protected against file deletion by mistake, or a disk crash (a major disk crash is not likely, but can happen)


You should store your source codes, scripts, notebooks, manuscripts, reports, figures, on a backed up directory, and only store on the project disks data downloaded from outside, or that you can regenerate with the backed up scripts

  • Location: /home/some_project_name/your_lsce_login
    • Ask your advisor if you should use a specific project directory and the technical details about it
    • Use this directory for storing the (big) data files that you can't store safely in the scratch directory, and should not store in the home directory
  • Backup: ask your advisor
  • Quota: ask your advisor

Determining the space used by directories

Your Linux environment may sometimes stop working correctly because you have exceeded the allowed quota on your disks (check your quotas with quota -s). You can use the following command to get the size of all the directories and files in the current directory, sorted by size: du -sh * | sort -rh

jypeter@obelix4 - ...jypeter - 46 >cd /home/scratch01/jypeter
/home/scratch01/jypeter

jypeter@obelix4 - ...jypeter - 47 >du -sh * | sort -rh
58M     GLAC1DHiceF26.nc
47M     dashboard
44M     GLAC1DdrainagePointerF26ka.nc
15M     octcdf
12M     1901.nc
3.2M    cmake
...

Which programs should you use?

Your advisor will let you know which (version of which) programs you should use. Some programs are available by default, and you have to use the module command to access other programs.

Which program am I using?

At any time, you can use the which command to determine where a program is located. The option to get the version information of a program may vary (launch the program without arguments, with -v or --v, …).

 > which ncdump
/usr/bin/ncdump

 > ncdump
ncdump [-c|-h] [-v ...] [[-b|-f] [c|f]] [-l len] [-n name] [-p n[,n]] [-k] [-x] [-s] [-t|-i] [-g ...] [-w] file
[...]
netcdf library version 4.3.3.1 of Dec 10 2015 16:44:18 $

 > which python
/usr/bin/python

 > python --version
Python 2.7.5

Using module to access optional programs

Main module options:

  • module list: list the currently loaded modules
  • module avail: list the available modules
  • module load module_a … module_n: load modules (automatically including dependencies)
    • module load module_a: load default version of module_a
    • module load module_a/vvv: load vvv version of module_a
  • module purge: remove all modules

Detailed example:

 > which ncview
ncview: Command not found.

 > module list
No Modulefiles Currently Loaded.

 > module avail
[...]
batch_env          grib_api/1.14.0    netcdf/4           python/3.6
[...]
glost/0.3.1        ncview/2.1.7       python/2.7

 > module load ncview netcdf/4

 > module list
Currently Loaded Modulefiles:
  1) ncview/2.1.7   2) netcdf/4
  
 > which ncview
/usr/local/install/ncview-2.1.7/bin/ncview

 > which ncdump
/usr/local/install/netcdf-4.3.2/bin/ncdump

Useful documentation for beginners

Linux/UNIX

You can also check the Les fondamentaux du pôle de modélisation du climat de l'IPSL wiki page

NetCDF and file formats

Using the Python language

Getting help (from the LSCE system administrators)

Send a mail to help-lsce

Describing your problem

When you need help from the administrators or other people, it will save a lot of time if you describe your problem as accurately as possible (do not just report XXXXX is not working as expected !)

You can copy-paste the error message(s). Finding the error log file(s) of the program/system (when available), or using the verbose mode of a program will make the problem resolution much easier and faster. The example below shows how to use the verbose mode of ssh

 >ssh -v obelix
OpenSSH_7.4p1, OpenSSL 1.0.2k-fips  26 Jan 2017
debug1: Reading configuration data /home/users/jypeter/.ssh/config
debug1: Reading configuration data /etc/ssh/ssh_config
debug1: /etc/ssh/ssh_config line 58: Applying options for *
debug1: Connecting to obelix [157.136.72.75] port 22.
debug1: Connection established.
debug1: key_load_public: No such file or directory
debug1: identity file /home/users/jypeter/.ssh/id_rsa type -1
[...]
debug1: Entering interactive session.
debug1: pledge: exec
debug1: client_input_global_request: rtype hostkeys-00@openssh.com want_reply 0
debug1: Requesting X11 forwarding with authentication spoofing.
debug1: Sending environment.
debug1: Sending env LANG = en_US
Last login: Thu Mar  1 15:52:44 2018 from lsce4078.lsce.ipsl.fr
Disk quotas for user jypeter (uid 6369):
     Filesystem   space   quota   limit   grace   files   quota   limit   grace
 prolix3:/users   4558M   9766M  10743M           23741       0       0
jypeter@obelix3 - ...jypeter - 41 >

Taking a screenshot

Sometimes, it may also help to send a picture of what is wrong!

On Linux, you should find a screenshot application in the tools available on the system. See the example below for people using the xfce windows manager Click to get a larger version

On Windows, you can use the Capture screen option of XnView Click to get a larger version

Accessing the LSCE servers from outside the LSCE

The only way to access the LSCE servers from outside LSCE is to connect first to the ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr gateway server.

Interactive access

  1. Send a mail to help-lsce, and request an access to the ssh1 server
  2. Use ssh to connect to ssh1
    • From a terminal on a Linux/Windows10/Mac computer: ssh -A -X your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr
    • From a Windows computer:
      • Text only: use Putty. Putty allows you to open text terminals on remote computers
      • Text and graphics: you need to install an X server on your computer in order to display the graphics
  3. You can access all LSCE disks from ssh1, but there is only a limited number of programs that you can run, so you have to go from ssh1 to obelix or irene with one of the ssh commands below:
    • ssh obelix
    • ssh your_tgcc_login@curie-ccrt.ccc.cea.fr
  4. It's possible to use only one line to to both ssh commands
    • obelix: ssh -A -X your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr -t ssh -A obelix
    • TGCC: ssh -A -X your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr -t ssh -A your_tgcc_login@curie-ccrt.ccc.cea.fr
  5. You can define an alias in order to connect more easily to the machines:
    • tcsh users: add the following line to your ~/.cshrc configuration file
      alias sobelix 'ssh -A -X your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr -t ssh -A obelix'
    • bash users: add the following line to your ~/.bashrc configuration file
      alias sobelix='ssh -A -X your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr -t ssh -A obelix'
  6. You should create and configure an ssh key, if you don't want to type your password each time you use ssh or scp
  7. If you want more information about ssh

Copying files to/from LSCE

If you need to transfer files to/from LSCE, use scp (on Linux and Windows 10), or a graphical scp client such as WinSCP (on Windows) between your computer and ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr

  • Example:
    • Sending one file from a Linux/Windows10/Mac computer to your scratch directory at LSCE:
      scp -p file_on_your_computer_outside_lsce your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr:/home/scratch01/your_lsce_login/
    • Sending recursively a full directory:
      scp -pr directory_on_your_computer_outside_lsce your_lsce_login@ssh1.lsce.ipsl.fr:/home/scratch01/your_lsce_login/

What next?

Ask you advisor, who has probably already told you everything that was listed above, so you did not really learn anything new by reading this page





[ PMIP3 Wiki Home ] - [ Help! ] - [ Wiki syntax ]

other/newppl/starting.1589551374.txt.gz · Last modified: 2020/05/15 14:02 by jypeter