freia for Observers

Observers can request a temporary guest account to reduce their SpeX or iSHELL data using Spextool. This could be useful for those without access to IDL at their home institution, for example.

  • Guest user accounts are good for 3 months. Accounts are then offered to others waiting.
  • An account could also be extended on request for 2 months; the account holder is responsible to request for extension.
  • Else, guest user files are deleted at the end of the access period.
  • Prerequisites:
    1. be comfortable with command line interface in a Unix environment (change directories; list, copy, rename files; etc);
    2. be able to connect via SSH in a terminal on your local computer to a remote host;
    3. be able to use VNC client (also known as "VNC viewer"; to connect to a local port on your computer to connect to a remote host at IRTF via SSH tunnel);
    4. if you are not comfortable with above prerequisites, please make sure that you have computer help available at your own institute.

Host freia is a standalone IRTF Linux workstation with limited guest user accounts. Properties ...

  • Rocky Linux 8 PC with XFCE desktop; updated periodically, unless there is an urgency.
  • IDL 7.x with Spextool for SpeX and iSHELL.
  • Does not share any other IRTF resources (observing account, raw data on /scrs1).
  • Provides 4 TB local disk space, shared among all guest users. A user must copy their data to and from.
  • There is no back up.

Request for a New Account

  1. Ensure that you meet the prerequisites.
  2. Send an email to a n u b h a v < a t > h a w a i i . e d u, with:
    1. your latest IRTF program name;
    2. name of the latest IRTF support astronomer that you had worked, or are working, with. To avoid delay, include that support astronomer as one of the email recipients if the person is still working at IRTF.

Password Change on First Login

New users are required to change SSH password on first login that is at least 16-character long. Use of a good password manager to generate strong passwords & to store is encouraged.

Do not share passwords, certainly not via email, either as text as as image. Do not send any password in relation to any account issues. If IRTF staff would need to access your account, they (Anubav A for now) will reset your password and notify you of the reset.

VNC Session

How do I VNC into my freia desktop?

The freia computer is behind a firewall. To VNC to the desktop, you will need to create a SSH tunnel (on your computer) to VNC server on freia.ifa.hawaii.edu host. See freia: VNC for Linux, MacOS, or Unix users, or freia: VNC for Windows users as applicable.

How do I start Spextool or IDL in the VNC session?

README.txt file in your HOME directory has the instructions on how to start Spextool for SpeX or iSHELL or how to run IDL on its own. To read ...

  1. Once on the VNC desktop, open a terminal.
  2. Type cat ~/README.txt or less -X ~/README.txt command in the terminal.

Data Transfer to & from freia

You should be able to use sftp or rsync to copy data to/from freia. Example: 

   # Replace 'USER-NAME' with your login account
   sftp USER-NAME@freia.ifa.hawaii.edu

   # Copy data TO freia.
   rsync --inc-recursive -plt -v --progress \
      /data/path/on/your/computer/ \
      USER-NAME@freia.ifa.hawaii.edu:/home/USER-NAME/save-here/

   # Copy data FROM freia.
   rsync --inc-recursive -plt -v --progress \
      USER-NAME@freia.ifa.hawaii.edu:/home/USER-NAME/saved/ \
      /freia-data/path/on/your/computer/

IRTF Staff Documentation

The freia Staff Page is for IRTF staff only.