Skip to content

Accessing BlueBEAR

Prerequisites

To access BlueBEAR, you need to:

  1. be a member of a BEAR project that has the BlueBEAR facility (see BEAR Project Registration)
  2. have an active BEAR Linux account (see activate BEAR Linux account)

For the security of the service, access is limited to machines on the campus network. The University provides a VPN, as part of the Remote Access Service, which allows you to be able to connect to BlueBEAR remotely.

Accessing BlueBEAR using BEAR Portal

BEAR Portal provides web-based access to a range of BlueBEAR services, such as JupyterLab, RStudio, and GUI applications. It also provides access to a BlueBEAR shell and a route for submitting BlueBEAR compute jobs.
BEAR Portal is only available from on-campus or through the University Remote Access Service.

Accessing BlueBEAR using the command line

Command-line access to BlueBEAR is via one of multiple login nodes, available from the address bluebear.bham.ac.uk.

Warning

The login nodes are provided for the following types of tasks:

  • submitting batch jobs
  • checking on the status of running or queuing jobs
  • editing files
  • file and directory operations such as copying, moving/renaming etc.

Login nodes must not be used for work requiring significant CPU resources, including analysis jobs running from a Graphical User Interface (GUI) such as those provided by some engineering or Computational Fluid Dynamics (CFD) codes.
Jobs requiring significant CPU/memory or multiple cores should be run in the batch system.
GUI applications should be run in BEAR Portal or through an interactive job.

Any work that is consuming significant CPU on a login node, or causing problems such as poor responsiveness of the login nodes for other users, may be stopped without warning.

How to connect

Lower-case Usernames

All account usernames on BlueBEAR are lower-case; thus, abc123 is a valid username whereas ABC123 is not.

Abstract

UoB: for devices managed by the University of Birmingham

Bitvise SSH Client

About Bitvise SSH Client

Bitvise is a free, flexible and feature-rich SSH client for Windows.

Installation

Bitvise is available via AppsAnywhere. (Please refer to the following KB article for general information on how to use AppsAnywhere: KB16361)

  1. Launch the AppsAnywhere portal.
  2. Search for "Bitvise SSH Client".
  3. Install the application.
Image: Installing Bitvise via AppsAnywhere

Installing Bitvise via AppsAnywhere Installing Bitvise via AppsAnywhere

Configuration

After launching Bitvise SSH Client, please follow the steps below to configure the connection:

  • Host: bluebear.bham.ac.uk.
  • Username: your UoB username (in lowercase).
  • Initial method (dropdown menu): Choose between 'keyboard interactive' or 'password'. The latter provides an option to store your encrypted password in the client.
Image: Entering information to configure Bitvise

Entering information to configure Bitvise Entering information to configure Bitvise

Once the information has been entered, click the "Log in" button. If this is the first time you have connected you will be prompted to accept the host key information – click "Accept and Save".

Image: A window pops up if you connect for the first time

A window pops up if you connect for the first time A window pops up if you connect for the first time

You can save this profile as a file to avoid having to enter the information on each occasion. Additionally, you can create a shortcut to the profile as a desktop icon that can be launched by double-clicking.

After logging in, new icons will appear on the left. Click "New terminal console" to access the command line interface, where you will be able to submit a job to BlueBEAR.

Image: New icons appear on the left after logging in

New icons appear on the left after logging in New icons appear on the left after logging in

Abstract

BYOD: stands for "Bring Your Own Device" and is for user-owned devices, that is those not managed by the University of Birmingham.

To connect to a BlueBEAR shell using Windows we recommend the following methods in order of preference:

  1. Using the Windows native ssh client in PowerShell, if this is available on your system (replacing _username_ with your username).

    Further information can be found here: KB14689
    Note that you may need to specify the MAC algorithm by including the following option:

    ssh -m hmac-sha2-512 _username_@bluebear.bham.ac.uk

  2. Using WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux), if this is available on your system.

    • If WSL is installed then please refer to the Linux or macOS method for connecting.

To connect to BlueBEAR on Linux or macOS, run the following command in your terminal (replacing _username_ with your username):

ssh _username_@bluebear.bham.ac.uk

Known Hosts file

It might be necessary to add or remove keys from the known_hosts file.
The method for doing this varies depending on operating system and is beyond the scope of this documentation – please refer to online sources for further information.

Troubleshooting

Fix Login

Several files are run by default when logging on or off. If these become corrupted or deleted a login session will be in an unpredictable state; a typical example of this happening is a non-standard command prompt.
If this happens the default files can be restored using the command

fixlogin

which will warn if any existing, and possibly corrupt, files are to be overwritten.
To restore the default files without being prompted use the command

fixlogin -y