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Technical Support

The WestGrid Support Team is comprised of system administrators and analysts from WestGrid's seven member institutions. Together, they work in collaboration with their Compute Canada counterparts across the country to provide essential support and service layers to ensure researchers get the most out of the national platform of resources available.

This page outlines a few of the ways you can get in touch with and use Support in WestGrid and Compute Canada:

Support documentation
Email contacts
On-campus support at WestGrid member institutions
Training events & resources

 

Support documentation

National Systems
(Arbutus, Cedar, Graham, Niagara, Béluga)

Other useful documentation / webpages

Other support resources you may find helpful can be found at these links:

  • Live system status: http://status.computecanada.ca - This is a live system status page for all of Compute Canada's national systems. If you are having difficulties accessing a system, check here to see if it is offline for some reason or only accessible under conditions.
  • Forgotten WestGrid passwords: https://www.westgrid.ca/support/accounts/passwords - If you are using WestGrid legacy systems Orcinus (based at the University of British Columbia) or Grex (based at the University of Manitoba), you are likely still using a WestGrid password to access these machines. If you forget your WestGrid password, the instructions on this page will help you retrieve / re-set it.
  • ownCloud storage: https://www.westgrid.ca/resources_services/data_storage/cloud_storage - ownCloud is a Dropbox-like cloud storage service. You can use your WestGrid username and password to login to the ownCloud server. A complete ownCloud user manual is available from doc.owncloud.org. All data transfers between local devices and WestGrid's ownCloud are encrypted.
  • FDTD solutions: https://www.westgrid.ca/support/software/lumerical_fdtd_solutions - The Lumerical Engine was formerly available to WestGrid users on the now-decommissioned Glacier system. Through a donation from Lumerical, this license has been extended to the Orcinus cluster.

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Email contacts

  • support@computecanada.ca - Email this address to receive technical support or advice from a Compute Canada or WestGrid Support Team member. To help Support serve you better, please include the following information in your email:
    • Your full name
    • Compute Canada username
    • University or institution
    • The name of the cluster you are / were using
    • Any additional information / details about your inquiry that can help our team members identify the issue and propse a solution (eg. scheduler job ID, examples of your job submission script, identify the commands that you were executing, identify the software (including the version) you were using, etc.)

  • accounts@computecanada.ca - Email this address regarding any questions or issues you have with your Compute Canada or WestGrid account. To help Support serve you better, please include the following information in your email:
    • Your full name
    • Compute Canada username (if you are an existing account holder)
    • University or institution
    • Any additional information / details about your inquiry that can help our team members identify the issue and propse a solution  

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On-campus support at WestGrid Member Institutions

WestGrid has team members based on campus at its seven member institutions who are available to assist with your high performance computing needs. They can help you troubleshoot issues, advise on best practices, deliver training, and offer other research computing support services. 

Any researcher, no matter where they are based, is welcome to contact support@westgrid.ca and a member of our Support Team will get in touch. 

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Training events & resources

WestGrid team members are available to support and run online and in-person training courses on a wide range of topics related to scientific computing, high-performance computing, data analysis, and visualization. These sessions can take any form, from interactive to simply information-sharing, and can range from one hour to multiple days. If you are looking for this or any customized training or would like to host a workshop, please let us know.

To tap into our existing training resources or browse archives from past training events, click the links below to:

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