Account are personal and login credentials must not be shared with others. If detected, access to the account will be automatically disabled. It is still possible and easy for multiple users to share and collaborate on the same folders and scripts. Don’t hesitate to ask if you don’t know how to do this - we’re here to help.
Access to Wynton HPC from outside of the UCSF network requires two-factor authentication (2FA). If you are on the UCSF VPN, you have already authenticated and no further 2FA is required. In all other cases, you will be prompted to authenticate through a Wynton-specific 2FA method when SSH:ing directly to the cluster. See Two-Factor Authentication for SSH for instructions.
To access the Wynton HPC cluster you need an account - any UCSF affiliate can get an account. Anyone with a Wynton HPC account, can access the cluster via Secure Shell (SSH).
The instructions below requires that you:
have an SSH client available on your local computer
have a Wynton HPC account (not the same as your UCSF account)
know your Wynton HPC username (not the same as your UCSF password)
know your Wynton HPC password (not the same as your UCSF password)
know whether you have a PHI or non-PHI Wynton HPC account (you only have a PHI account if you requested it)
Users on Linux, macOS, and MS Windows have an SSH client built-in, which is available from the terminal as ssh. We will use that one in all our examples. You can also use other SSH clients if you prefer, include PuTTY on MS Windows. If you choose to use another SSH client, consult that program’s documentation for further instructions. Another alternative, which some might find easier, is to connect to the cluster using the X2Go software.
Problem logging in? It might be that you have a PHI account, but you try to log into a non-PHI login node. Set the following switch to tailor the instructions on the website to PHI users:
If this is the first time you access Wynton HPC and you are outside of the UCSF network, we recommend that you first log onto the UCSF VPN before continuing below. This avoids having to deal with Wynton’s two-factor authentication that is otherwise required when accessing the cluster from outside of the UCSF. Note that this advice is just to get you started. In the long run, you do not want to be on the very bandwidth-limited UCSF VPN if you are transferring large amounts of files to and from Wynton to your local machine.
To log into the cluster, assuming your user name on Wynton HPC is alice (case sensitive), do the following:
For first-timers outside of the UCSF network, log onto the UCSF VPN,
open a terminal (‘Terminal’ on macOS and most Linux distributions, and ‘Windows Console’ [old] or ‘Windows Terminal’ [modern] on MS Windows),
at the terminal prompt, type ssh alice@log1.wynton.ucsf.edu and press ENTER, and
when prompted, enter your Wynton HPC password.
When logging in from your local computer, you should see something like:
{local}$ ssh alice@log1.wynton.ucsf.edu
alice@log1.wynton.ucsf.edu:s password:
[alice@log1 ~]$
Note, when typing your password, there will be no visual feedback at all, but the system will still receive what you type, so just press ENTER afterward.
If you get Permission denied, please try again. when you enter your password, make sure you use the correct Wynton HPC username (case sensitive) and the correct password.
It is possible to set up password-less authentication via a public-private SSH key pair. For details, see the how-to page Log in without Password.
The login node is dedicated solely to very basic tasks such as copying and moving files on the shared file system, submitting jobs, and checking the status on existing jobs. Note that most software tools are not available on the login node, which means you can neither use it for prototyping scripts nor build software. Instead, for such tasks, use a development node, which is configured identically to the compute nodes.
Like for all Unix-based system, to log out from Wynton HPC, type exit or logout (standard Unix commands) and press ENTER. For example,
[alice@log1 ~]$ exit
Connection to log1.wynton.ucsf.edu closed.
{local}$
An alternative is to press Ctrl-D (sends “End-Of-File” [EOF]) at the command-line prompt.
Any shell session that has been idle for more than eight hours will timeout and exit automatically.