Appendix: Creating a GridPP CernVM User Interface

If you don't have an account on a grid-ready cluster, don't worry - this section will show you how to create a Virtual Machine (VM) that will, essentially, act as a grid User Interface (UI) within whatever operating system you happen to be using at the moment. We will do this using the CernVM service, and create a guest CernVM on your host system. There are a number of reasons to do this:

  1. The CernVM can act as a pre-built Grid User Interface (UI) that will give you all the tools you need (e.g. a command line terminal, text editors, etc.) to get the most out of the Grid;
  2. Your CernVM will also give you instant access to the CernVM-File System (CVMFS). A lot of the software we will use to manage our grid jobs and data is provided using this, with the huge bonus of not needing any installation by you.
  3. Most of the Grid tools we will use are compiled to run on the CentOS7 linux distro; With a CernVM you'll be able to use them out of the box;
  4. The standard Grid Worker Nodes you'll be using to run your software on use CentOS7 machines. If your code runs on your CernVM, it will run on the Grid;
  5. What's more, if everyone uses the CernVM as their Grid UI, we at GridPP will only have to support one operating system (i.e. the CentOS7 supplied with the CernVM). If we're singing from the same (virtual) hymn sheet, we'll be able to recreate your problems and help you solve them more easily.

All you need to provide is the RAM and the hard disk space on your local host machine.

If you already have access to a user account on a linux terminal, for example on a university computing cluster, you can probably skip this section.

An overview of the process

To create and configure a CernVM that will meet our needs, you will need to:

  1. Install some virtualisation software on your host machine;
  2. Download the appropriate CernVM Virtual Machine baseline image from the CernVM service;
  3. Create a new guest CernVM using the CernVM image;
  4. Configure the guest CernVM so that it has access to the host hard disk;
  5. Configure the CernVM for Grid use by applying the GridPP contextualisation.

Let's look at each of these stages in a bit more detail.

The virtualisation software

You can find a list of compatible virtualisation software solutions on the CernVM image download page here. It doesn't really matter which you use but we've had success with this version of VirtualBox (Windows 7).

This is the one bit that's a bit tricky for us to support - how you do this will depend on your local machine and its setup. Remember, search engines and StackOverflow are your friends here.

Creating your CernVM

Depending on the virtualisation solution you picked (and got working) above, download the baseline CernVM image file from here.

At the time of writing (October 2015), the latest version was CernVM 3.5.1.

Then use your virtualisation software to create a new VM from the downloaded image. You should be able to find instructions for how to do this from your virtualisation software provider. Use as much RAM as you can spare (up to about half of your host machine's total RAM) and use a virtual hard disk of about 30 GB.

Once you have created your CernVM, but before you start it, you will need setup the contextualisation for your CernVM.

Contextualising your CernVM

The CernVM service offers the ability to contextualise a CernVM with pre-defined settings, environment variables, etc. that are put in place when the CernVM is first booted. This is known as pairing the VM. You can create your own contextuallisations, but it is also possible for individuals to create public contexts (e.g. for LHC experiments, open data initiatives, etc.) that anyone can use.

We have created such a context for GridPP. You can use it to get going with the Grid. Importantly, you do not need a CERN account to do this, so it is possible for anyone with a grid certificate to use it!

To pair your local CernVM with the GridPP context:

  1. Log in to the CernVM service: You can do this here. If you don't have a CERN account, you can register here.
  2. Visit the CernVM Marketplace: This can be found here.
  3. Select the GridPP CernVM context: Select Experimental from the panel on the right, and then click on the gridpp-cernvm context.
  4. Boot up your local CernVM: Once the boot process has finished, you should be presented with a login prompt. Don't enter anything yet.
  5. Pair with the GridPP context: Returning to the GridPP CernVM Marketplace, click on the Pair button on the panel on the right. This will generate a six-figure PIN.
  6. Apply the context to your VM: Returning to your booted-up CernVM, enter the PIN (preceeded by a hash, as instructed at the login prompt). The CernVM webpage will now update indicating the VM has been successfully paired. Your VM will then be restarted and contextualised.
  7. Log in to your GridPP CernVM: Once the context has been applied to your CernVM, you will be presented with a graphical login screen (as opposed to the text login prompt). Use the username gridpp and password gridpp to log in to your CernVM.

And that's it! You now have a shiny new GridPP CernVM from which you'll be able to access the Grid.

Two final things

Configure git

We'll be using git (and GitHub) to access various pieces of code and scripts. The CernVM comes with git installed but you'll need to configure it with your username and email address. This can be done with the following commands:

$ git config --global user.name "Ada Lovelace"
$ git config --global user.email alovelace@qmul.ac.uk

Local hard disk access

Before we move on, it's important to note that you will need to be able to access the hard disk of your host machine from that of your guest CernVM. This is so that you can move any files that you need across to the CernVM - most importantly, your Grid certificate file.

With VirtualBox, for example, this is achieved using the Shared Folders functionality.

Before proceeding, you should make sure that you can access the parts of your local hard disk that contain any software or data that you want to copy across.

Let's review what we've done with the checklist.

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