Helpdesk

What is NX/Nomachines?

NX (or nomachines) is a type of connection method that allows a graphical login to calypso, our Linux-based cluster head node. Calypso has NX server software on it and you use a special NX client on your workstation (available from nomachine.com. The end result is something similar to X11-over-ssh but easier to use and much quicker. It's more like using remote desktop to Titan.

This document covers how to configure the NX client as a user of calypso. It does not cover how to install NX client- please contact us for assistance with installing the software.

You will also need a calypso key file - please contact us for this when you have the client installed. It should be named calypso.key.

Configuration

Configuration needs to be done once- once you have configured it, you will not need to do so again for your user account on the particular machine you configure.

To run NX client for the first time, look for it in your Start->Programs menu. You will be greeted by this wizard screen. It's not very informative, but Windows applications seem to like to reassure users about things. Just click the Next button, as everyone has been trained to do by such things.

The next screen asks you what the session parameters are. The session name is just a name you will use for this series of settings - just put calypso. The hostname is a bit more important: is should be exactly calypso.genetics.ucla.edu. The internet connection setting can be left at the default if you are configuring within the department. If you are setting up a system to connect to calypso from home, you may want to drop it down to IDSL or Modem.

Despite what this screen may lead you to believe, you're not really done yet. Click the Finish and ponder the inappropriateness of that label.

This is the login screen, but you are not ready yet to login. Instead, you need to do some more configuration, so click the Configure button.

OK, so things look a lot more complicated now. So much for the wizard. The first thing you might want to do is change the desktop type next to Unix to GNOME from the default (which should be KDE. You don't have to, but GNOME is something more users are familiar with.

Next, click on the Key button to configure the login key (which you should have on hand somewhere).

Here, you need to click the Import button and navigate to the key file you were given (ie calypso.key). Once you have done so, and loaded it, click the Save.

OK, now you're done. Click OK until you are back to the login screen and enter your calypso username and password before clicking the Login button. After a short wait, you should be logged into calypso's graphical environment.

If it's the first time connecting and you get an error, please try quitting the NX client and restarting it (sometimes it needs a little shaking). If you continue to have trouble, please contact us via the helpdesk and provide the text of the error log that appears under Details.