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Getting Started

A step-by-step guide to connecting, signing in, and launching your first GPU workspace.

Access: All users with a platform account provisioned by an administrator.

Prerequisites

Requirement Details
Browser Chrome, Firefox, Edge, or Safari (latest version)
Account Username and password provided by your platform admin
VPN client OpenVPN-compatible client (see Step 1 below)

VPN is required

The platform runs on a private network. Connect via OpenVPN first, then use the DNS names under cscc.nthu.edu.tw; do not browse raw infrastructure URLs.

Step 1 — Install a VPN Client

OS Recommended Client Install
Windows OpenVPN Connect Download installer from the official site
macOS Tunnelblick or OpenVPN Connect brew install --cask tunnelblick
Linux OpenVPN CLI sudo apt install openvpn or sudo dnf install openvpn

Step 2 — Connect to the VPN

  1. Obtain the Platform-VPN.ovpn configuration file — it is located at scripts/vpn/Platform-VPN.ovpn, or ask your administrator for a copy.
  2. Import it into your VPN client:
    • Windows / macOS GUI: drag the .ovpn file onto the client window, or use Import Profile.
    • Linux CLI: sudo openvpn --config scripts/vpn/Platform-VPN.ovpn
  3. When prompted, enter your LDAP username and password (same credentials you use to sign in).
  4. Wait for the connection to establish — the client shows a green indicator or Initialization Sequence Completed.

Verify connectivity

Open a terminal and run: 

nslookup dashboard.cscc.nthu.edu.tw
If the name resolves and the dashboard opens, you are connected. If not, check that UDP port 31194 is not blocked by your firewall.

Windows route check

If OpenVPN shows connected but 192.168.109.1 is unreachable, open PowerShell and run route print | findstr 192.168.109. The output should include a 192.168.109.0 route through the OpenVPN adapter. If it is missing, re-import the latest Platform-VPN.ovpn.

The VPN profile accepts platform DNS for cscc.nthu.edu.tw, but does not enable block-outside-dns. Use Resolve-DnsName dashboard.cscc.nthu.edu.tw to confirm platform DNS and http://192.168.109.1:30080 for low-level connectivity checks.

Step 3 — Sign In to the Platform

  1. Open your browser and navigate to: 
    https://dashboard.cscc.nthu.edu.tw
  2. You will see the login page with three fields:
Field Description
Username Your LDAP account username
Password Your LDAP account password
CAPTCHA Type the 4-character code shown in the image (case-insensitive)
  1. Fill in all three fields and click SIGN IN.

Sign-in page Figure 1: Login page with username, password, and CAPTCHA fields.

sequenceDiagram
    participant User
    participant Browser
    participant Gateway
    participant Backend
    participant LDAP

    User->>Browser: Enter credentials + CAPTCHA
    Browser->>Gateway: POST /api/v1/login
    Gateway->>Backend: Forward request
    Backend->>LDAP: Bind with user DN + password
    LDAP-->>Backend: Bind success
    Backend-->>Browser: JWT token + user profile
    Browser-->>User: Redirect to Home Dashboard

CAPTCHA tips

  • The code is case-insensitive — Ab3K and ab3k both work.
  • Click the CAPTCHA image to refresh it if it is hard to read.

Step 4 — Explore the Home Dashboard

After login you land on the Home Dashboard at /.

Widget What It Shows
GPU Availability Free vs. allocated DRA GPU units across the cluster
Project Summary Your active projects and their status
Resource Usage CPU / Memory / GPU trends (7-day or 30-day toggle)
Activity Feed Recent actions by you and your team
Active GPU Jobs Running workspaces with GPU, SM share, and memory

Home dashboard overview Figure 2: Home dashboard showing GPU availability card and active jobs table.

Step 5 — Check Your Project

  1. Navigate to Projects in the left sidebar (Workspace section).
  2. A personal project is auto-created when your account is provisioned — look for a project named after your username.
  3. Click the project card to view its quota (GPU, CPU, Memory limits) and members.

Projects list Figure 3: Projects page showing personal project card with quota summary.

No project visible?

Ask your administrator to assign you to a project or group, or check that your account has been fully provisioned.

Step 6 — Launch Your First Workspace

  1. Navigate to Workspaces in the left sidebar.
  2. Click + New Workspace.
  3. Fill in the launch form:
Field What to Choose
Project Select your project (personal or team)
IDE Type JupyterLab or VS Code
Image Base, PyTorch, TensorFlow, or custom
CPU Number of CPU cores (e.g., 2)
Memory RAM in GB (e.g., 8)
GPU Number of GPUs and optional SM share (e.g., 1 GPU at 100% SM)
Storage Mount your personal or group storage volume
  1. Click Create.
  2. Wait for the status badge to change from Starting (yellow) → Running (green).
  3. Click Open — your IDE opens in a new browser tab.

New workspace form Figure 4: Workspace creation form with project, IDE type, and resource fields.

Workspace won't start?

  • Verify your project has sufficient quota remaining.
  • Check if the scheduling plan window is currently active (ask your admin).
  • If the image is custom, it may take longer to pull on first launch.

Step 7 — Manage Your Storage

  1. Navigate to Storage in the left sidebar (Resources section).
  2. Click Start on your personal storage to launch the file browser.
  3. Click Browse — a FileBrowser UI opens where you can upload, download, rename, and organise files.
  4. Files stored here persist across workspace restarts.

Storage browser Figure 5: FileBrowser interface showing personal storage contents.

Step 8 — Join a Group (Optional)

  1. Navigate to Groups in the left sidebar.
  2. Browse available groups or ask your admin to add you.
  3. Group members share a group storage volume — useful for datasets and shared models.
  4. Group managers can set per-user permissions (Read / Write / None) on shared storage.

Service Quick Reference

Regular users should use only the platform dashboard. The API and service hostnames are routed through the gateway and are reserved for the dashboard, CLI, integrations, or administrators.

Service URL Purpose
Dashboard https://dashboard.cscc.nthu.edu.tw Main platform UI for users

Troubleshooting

VPN connects but dashboard DNS does not resolve

Ensure your VPN client accepts the DNS settings from the profile. Some clients require enabling DNS update scripts or importing the profile again. The user-facing entrypoint is https://dashboard.cscc.nthu.edu.tw.

CAPTCHA is wrong but I typed it correctly

CAPTCHA is case-insensitive. If the image is unclear, click it to get a new code. Avoid confusing 0/O or 1/I — the generator excludes ambiguous characters.

Login fails with 'Invalid credentials'

Verify you are using your LDAP username (not email). If your password was recently changed in the LDAP directory, the old password is invalidated immediately.

Workspace stuck in 'Starting' state

This usually means the container image is being pulled for the first time (can take several minutes for large GPU images). If it stays in Starting for more than 10 minutes, check with your admin that the scheduling queue is active and your project's plan window is open.

Session expired — redirected to login

JWT tokens expire after a configurable period. Simply sign in again. Your workspace state is preserved.