Admin Access to Class Instances

On this page:


Introduction

The instructor(s) of a class can request admin access to their class instance on IDAS.

Admin access allows the instructors to log in to their students' IDAS sessions. This can be helpful in the following scenarios:

  • The instructors can help a student stop or restart their IDAS session.

  • The instructors can log in to a student’s IDAS session and reproduce an error message.

  • The instructors can log in to a student’s IDAS session and find the cause of an error.

To request admin access to your class instance on IDAS, please email research-computing@uiowa.edu.

  • Only the instructors of a class can have admin access to their class instance on IDAS. We cannot give admin access to a student.

  • Once you have admin access to your class instance on IDAS, please do not remove any Research Services staff members from their admin role. Research Services staff members need their admin role in order to help troubleshoot issues in your class.

Logging into student’s session

Once you have been given admin access to your class instance on IDAS, follow these steps to log into your student’s session.

1. Log in to your class at https://notebooks.hpc.uiowa.edu/

2. In the upper left corner, click on Admin.

 

Admin tab

 

Don’t see the Admin tab in your class instance?

 

3. On the Admin page, each user is listed as uiowa_HawkID, where HawkID is the user’s HawkID.

 

users listed on Admin page

 

4. To search for a student, start entering their HawkID in the Search users box in the upper left corner.

 

search users box

 

5. If the user doesn’t have a session running, you can click either Start Server or Spawn Page to start a session for that user.

 

It might take a few minutes for the session to fully start. Once the session has started successfully, you will see the options Stop Server and Access Server, like in the next step.

 

Start Server

 

6. If the user has a session running, you can click Stop Server to stop their session.

This will stop any code that is running in the user’s session. Make sure you want to stop their session before clicking on this option.

 

Stop Server

 

7. When the user has a session running, you can click Access Server to log in to their session.

 

Access Server

 

 

In the next screen, click Authorize.

Authorize access

 

Once you have accessed a user’s session, you essentially impersonated the user. You will see all contents in the user’s IDAS home directory, including files, datasets, and code. You will be able to modify all contents in the user’s account.

As a reminder, only the instructors of a class can have admin access to their class instance on IDAS. We cannot give admin access to a student.

 

8. When you are done with the student’s session or the Admin page, close the browser tab.

 

close the browser tab

 

Other support articles

Find more support articles by expanding the heading “Interactive Data Analytics Service Documentation” in the sidebar to the left of this page.

Contact

If you have any questions or comments, please contact research-computing@uiowa.edu.