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Jupyter and RStudio as NAIRR Classroom Resource

 

Overview

The Anvil cluster at Purdue University provides an integrated, web-based solution for interactive computing through the Open OnDemand portal: http://ondemand.anvil.rcac.purdue.edu.


Within this environment, users can launch Jupyter Notebook and RStudio Server sessions directly in their browser. These tools make it possible to perform data analysis, visualization, and machine learning on Anvil’s high-performance computing (HPC) resources without requiring command-line interaction. This resource is widely used in teaching and research, including by over 1,000 students in Purdue’s DataMine program, making it one of the most tested and classroom-ready HPC-based Jupyter/RStudio deployments in the U.S.

Key Features

  • Browser-based access: No SSH required; sessions run on Anvil but display in the user’s browser.
  • Interactive applications: Launch Jupyter Notebook or RStudio Server directly from the Open OnDemand dashboard.
  • Resource selection: Choose number of cores, memory, and GPU options at session launch.
  • Integrated storage: Full access to home, scratch, and project file systems.
  • Pre-installed libraries:
    • Jupyter includes common Python data science and ML packages (NumPy, SciPy, pandas, TensorFlow, PyTorch, etc.).
    • RStudio includes support for CRAN and Bioconductor libraries, with the ability to add more.
  • Consistency: RStudio mirrors the familiar desktop IDE; Jupyter supports notebooks, terminals, and interactive Python workflows.
  • Scalability: Suitable for both small exploratory analyses and larger HPC-backed workloads.

Access

  1. Navigate to the Anvil Open OnDemand portal: ondemand.anvil.rcac.purdue.edu.
  2. Log in with your Purdue or ACCESS credentials.
  3. From the top menu, select Interactive Apps → Jupyter Notebook or RStudio Server.
  4. Specify resources (cores, memory, time limit, GPU if needed) and launch the session.
  5. The application will open in a new browser tab.

A detailed login guide is available here:Anvil OOD User Guide.

Use Cases

  • Education and training: Used extensively by Purdue’s DataMine program to support classroom instruction at scale.
  • Data science and ML workflows: Interactive exploration, model development, and GPU-accelerated training.
  • Statistics and reproducible research: RStudio supports RMarkdown, CRAN, and Bioconductor for statistical modeling and bioinformatics.
  • Rapid prototyping: Test and visualize code interactively before scaling to batch jobs.