Math Account

Math Account

In the old days, academic departments had their own computer systems with their own separate user accounts. Math was no exception. Most things are now centralized, or hosted on external services, but the Math department has a few unique needs that would not be cost effective in the centralized model. Also, there are many people at Math who prefer to work in the computing environment they have always found familiar. So, we took our old traditional system, fixed it up, updated it, and modernized it. The result is a system that meets both the old needs and the new needs, and does it in a way that is orders of magnitude less expensive than equivalent services from outside the department.

The math account is a username and password that is used to access the math department computing resources.

Why not just use NetIDs?

The old system existed long before NetIDs, and there are many people who are still using their pre-NetID accounts for regular work. Also, there are many rules and constraints to connecting math department machines to the central Cornell system.

The biggest reason is performance. Some parts of the system need to make many calls across the network for some operations, and it would be much slower. Also, the central system can be changed without notice, or may go down for maintenance. So we've had better speed and reliability with our separate system.

The next reason is security. The Math account is controlled by the NetID, such as for password reset, but there is nothing in a person's NetID account that is accessible from their Math account. So, math researchers can do what they want, and this separation keeps the Cornell system safe.

In the future, it may be desirable to set up access to the system that uses NetIDs as the primary username. This is possible if it's found to be necessary.

Math Account Resources

• A consistent desktop environment across all systems, from desktop workstations, to large number crunchers, to pay-as-you-go systems at the Center for Advanced Computing, or Amazon AWS.
• A personal file storage area that is backed up regularly, in your home directory.
• Access to a very large, fast volume for larger datasets, in the /space volume.
• Access to very fast local storage on all of the machines, in /local
• Commercial software such as Matlab, Mathematica, Maple, Magma, and many others, already configured for GPU and cluster access.
• Major free software titles, configured and ready to use, with GPU or cluster support as applicable. These include GAP, pari/gp, Macaulay2, Sage, Python, R, Julia, and many more.
• Latex composition tools as well as LibreOffice, pdf conversion tools, and much more.
• Access to all systems using JupyterHub, to take advantage of all of these resources through a persistent jupyter notebooks interface.
• In-browser file transfer in and out of the system, using JupyterHub or Webdisk.
• In-browser access to the Linux desktop environment where all of these tools are available.

Getting a Math Account

Anyone at Math who is a member of the math.instructors group may send an invite to a NetID to set up a Math account, by going to https://accounts.math.cornell.edu/ and clicking the 'invite user' link.

If you don't have a math account and you would like one, ask a math instructor, or email mathsystems@cornell.edu to request one.

Anyone with a NetID may have a math account, all we ask is that they're respectful of system resources (details below).

Resource Usage

Commercial software such as Matlab, Mathematica, and Maple have a limited number of licenses. This means there can only be a certain number of these programs running at any given time in the department (including Math machines running in the cloud). Please don't leave these programs running when they're not in use, since you'll be taking up a license. Priority for these programs is for Math faculty, grad students, and researchers. Right now there is no restriction on who can run these programs, but if people have trouble getting an available license, access may be restricted to certain groups.

Files in your home account, under /homes/{username} are backed up every 24 hours. Please be aware of how much space you are using. A few gigabytes is fine, but large data will fill up our backups. Use the /space volume for that. We don't strictly enforce file quotas, but if there is a problem with accounts filling up, we may have to.

The /space volume is large and fast. You may put large amounts of data into /space, all we ask is that you are a 'good neighbor' and don't abuse the privilege. Files in the /space volume can be read at 10GB/second by the calculation machines. /space is not officially backed up, but we usually make snapshots nightly, just in case. This backup is not guaranteed to happen the way it is for your home account. To use the /space volume, make a directory there whose name is the same as your username. Then you may put whatever you want inside that directory.

Each machine has a /local volume. Some are larger than others. They are all VERY fast because they're on the local machine. Remember, the contents of /local will be different on every machine. Just like on /space, you may create a directory with the same name as your username, then put whatever you want inside there. Please be careful not to fill up the volume, use the df command to check the percentage of space used.

Connecting to your Math account

Connecting is very easy these days. Due to increased security requirements from Cornell, we have a portal where all of our in-browser resources are available behind a single Cornell NetID login.

Once logged in, you have a menu with access to various resources. This resource menu will change as it's improved and new services are added.

• Web Desktop lets you connect to a Math department Linux desktop, inside your browser, without any additional software or VPN.
• JupyterHub lets you log in to a Jupyter Notebook on any of the systems. You can also open a terminal and transfer files.
• Webdisk lets you transfer files and do some other operations. It's older and you can do all of this with JupyterHub, but some people still like it.
• System Status (graphs) lets you see system resource usage in real-time (once a minute) so you can see which systems are busy and what's going on with your jobs.
• Wiki is a link to this wiki site. You may edit or add pages! Just click 'Log In' and your NetID should appear in the upper right.
• Account Settings takes you to the 'accounts' page, where you can reset your password, or if you're an instructor, you can invite users and manage your groups.
• Print Portal allows printing from any network or device, with a login. You must be in the math.dept group to use this. Upload a PDF and print it, from any phone, tablet, or computer. Please only use this when physically present at Malott hall!

These services use your Math username and password. If you're prompted for a password, that's the one to use.

Some of these use your NetID, such as wiki, graphs, or print portal. Since you're already logged in with your NetID, you should not be prompted when you use these services.

Account Settings will always prompt you again for a NetID login, for security reasons.

Other Connections

You can also connect in more traditional ways, using the Cornell VPN. You can use SSH, SFTP, and other desktop software such as X2GO or Remote Desktop Connection.