Getting Started Guide

Before you start: if you are outside the university network, connect through WireGuard VPN before opening the portal or trying to log in over SSH.

Initial Setup Process

1

Receive the Welcome Email

Your PI, lab administrator, or cluster administrator creates your HPC account. After that, you receive a welcome email with:

  • an account activation link,
  • instructions for preparing your SSH keys,
  • and, when applicable, your personal WireGuard VPN configuration file.

The activation link is time-limited, so it is best to complete activation soon after receiving the email.

2

Connect to WireGuard VPN

If you are working off-campus, connect to the VPN before accessing the portal or cluster services:

1. Install the WireGuard client on your device 2. Import the .conf file attached to your welcome email 3. Activate the tunnel 4. Only then open the portal or try to connect over SSH

If you are already on the university network, VPN may not be required.

3

Activate Your Account

Open the activation link from the welcome email. During activation you will:

  1. set your account password,
  2. optionally paste or upload your SSH public key,
  3. finish the initial activation of your HPC account.
After activation succeeds, your account is ready to use.
4

Prepare Your SSH Key Pair

SSH keys are recommended because they allow passwordless login after initial setup.

On Windows 10/11, macOS, and Linux, a common option is: ssh-keygen -t ed25519 -C "your.email@example.com"

This normally creates:

  • a private key, which should stay only on your own computer,
  • a matching public key, usually stored in a file ending with .pub.

During activation, upload or paste only the public key.

If you set a passphrase on the private key, that passphrase protects the key file on your device. It is not the same as your HPC Portal password.
5

Log In to the Login Node

After activation, connect to the login node at 10.149.156.60.

# Login with password ssh your_username@10.149.156.60 # Login with SSH key ssh -i ~/.ssh/id_ed25519 your_username@10.149.156.60

Replace your_username with your HPC username and adjust the key path if you use a different file name.

6

Check Your Environment

Once logged in, verify the basic environment:

pwd whoami hostname quota -s
7

Submit Your First SLURM Job

Create a simple batch script:

#!/bin/bash #SBATCH --job-name=test #SBATCH --output=output.txt #SBATCH --ntasks=1 #SBATCH --time=00:10:00 echo "Hello from HPC!"

Submit it with:

sbatch script.sh

Quick Commands

Command Description
sinfo View cluster partition status
squeue View running and pending jobs
sbatch script.sh Submit a batch job
srun --pty bash Start interactive session
scancel JOBID Cancel a job

Next Steps

Learn SLURM
Storage Guide