Dr. Nisha Ghatak1, Mr. Jun Huh1, Dr. Chris Scott1, Mr. Kahu Anderson1
1New Zealand eScience Infrastructure, Aotearoa / New Zealand
Biography:
Nisha Ghatak – Nisha is a Research Communities Advisor – Training Lead at NeSI. She facilitates skill development efforts nationally and supports training communities through her role as a community coordinator for The Carpentries in Aotearoa New Zealand. Nisha was also recently elected to the Board of Directors for The Carpentries.
Jun Huh – Jun Huh is a Product Manager at NeSI. Jun brings his experience from start-up industries into the field of eResearch. He has been involved in genomic data management, and data sovereignty related projects in the recent past years, including Aotearoa Genomic Data Repository and Rakeiora Pathfinder project. Recently he has been focused on service design facilitation to help launching of NeSI's new Flexible HPC.
Chris Scott – Chris Scott is a Research Software Engineer working at NeSI with a background in Computational Materials Modelling and High Performance Computing. He works with researchers around New Zealand through NeSI's Consultancy Service to help them develop and optimise code for their research.
Kahu Anderson is a Research DevOps Support Engineer at NeSI with a strong background in Information Technology. He is currently the 'pathfinder' when it comes to NeSI's new FlexiHPC Platform, providing the Support team with information and documentation to facilitate collaboration between researchers and NeSI's new platform.
Abstract:
New Zealand eScience Infrastructure (NeSI) has launched a transformative cloud-based Training Environment using Open OnDemand, marking a significant step in enhancing user experience and accessibility for the research community.
By leveraging community feedback and sector best practices, NeSI designed and deployed this training environment through close collaboration between technical experts, product designers, and stakeholders. Key strategies included integrating user-friendly interfaces, streamlining workflows, and enhancing support resources to ensure seamless navigation and engagement.
Workshops such as Introduction to R, Machine Learning and Image Analysis, and RNA Sequencing were piloted on the new training environment to assess and enhance its functionality. The overall user experience has been incredibly positive, prompting us to explore ways to enhance it further.
The team aimed for a training environment that could be quickly deployed at any time, easing the setup of trainee accounts (previously hindered by the need for NeSI HPC accounts). We wanted our partnering trainers, starting with trainers from Genomics Aotearoa, to provision a training environment with minimal assistance from NeSI, with the potential for additional long-term goals. We leveraged Open OnDemand and OpenStack cloud infrastructure, utilising Terraform and Ansible for a code-based deployment approach, which helps with reproducibility, interoperability, and portability.
Currently, the OpenOnDemand training environment is at a pivotal juncture, with significant progress in development and testing. Preliminary user trials and feedback have provided valuable insights for further refinement. To support NeSI’s commitment to innovation and improvement, this presentation maps progress and invites feedback on refinement tactics.