Introduction

The DSRI (Data Science Research Infrastructure) is a cluster of servers for deploying workspaces and applications for data science. Workspaces run in Docker containers orchestrated by Kubernetes and are accessible via an auto-generated URL.

Using the DSRI

✅ What can be done

• Gain access to more computing resources (memory and CPUs), which enables you to load larger amount of data, or use more threads for parallelized tasks
• Run jobs that take a long time to complete
• Deploy any database or service you need, and connect to it from your workspace easily
• Book and start a workspace that uses one of our GPUs
• The DSRI proposes a number of popular workspaces to work with data:
  • Multiple flavors of JupyterLab (scipy, tensorflow, all-spark, and more)
  • VisualStudio Code server (also available within the JupyterLab workspaces)
  • RStudio, with a complementary Shiny server
  • Matlab
  • Ubuntu Desktop (available on demand)
• You can then install anything you want in your workspace using conda, pip, or apt.

❌ What cannot be done

• Since DSRI can only be accessed when using the UM VPN, deployed services will not be available on the public Internet
• All activities must be legal in nature. You must closely examine and abide by the terms and conditions of any data, software, or web service that you use as part of your work
• You cannot reach data or servers hosted at Maastricht University from the DSRI by default. You will need to request access in advance here
• Right now it is not possible to reach the central UM fileservices (MFS)

Request an account

If you are working at Maastricht University, you can request an account, and run your services on the DSRI.

Data storage

DSRI is a computing infrastructure, built and used to run data science workloads. DSRI stores data in a persistent manner, but all data stored on the DSRI is susceptible to be altered by the workloads you are running, and we cannot guarantee its immutability.

Always keep a safe copy of your data outside the DSRI. And don't rely on the DSRI for long term storage.

Overview of the DSRI architecture