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iRODS

CyVerse Support

If you are looking for information on how to connect to CyVerse's data store, see their iRODS documentation for a guide.

Only use on DTNs

iRODS should only be used on the data transfer nodes (DTNs)(1), which are equipped to handle large data transfers. Use of iRODS on the compute nodes may result in system or network issues.

  1. Hostname: filexfer.hpc.arizona.edu

iRODS 4 is installed as a standard package on the operating systems of the data transfer nodes. You will need to iinit the first time you use the software (see below).

Initializing iRODS

Running iinit for any system using iRODS 4.x, unlike its iRODS 3 counterpart, does not help you set up the environment. Instead, you need to run create_irods_env with suitable options for the iRODS host, zone, username, etc manually.

For this key Enter this
-h <hostname of iRODS server>
-p <port number of iRODS server> (1247 is default)
-z <Zone name of iRODS zone>
-u <user name on the iRODS server> (may not match your netid)
-a <authentication method for the iRODS server> (PAM, native,...)

For example 

create_irods_env -a native -h someserver.somewhere.net -z MYZONE

will suffice to create an appropriate ~/.irods/irods_environment.json file to allow you to run iinit; we took the default -p 1247, -u <your NetId> in the above example by omitting -p and -u. You only need to do this step one time; subsequent times you will just run iinit and it will asked for your password. Note create_irods_env will not overwrite or alter an existing ~/.irods/irods_environment.json file.

Once the ~/.irods/irods_environment.json file is created properly, you should be able to sign in to the iRODS server your selected using iinit, viz:

$ iinit
Enter your current ... password:    # enter your iRODS server password here

At this point you can use other iRods commands such as icp to move files.

Examples

Tip

In the following examples:

  • my-files-to-transfer/ is the example name of the directory or folder for bulk transfers.
  • my-file-to-transfer.txt is the example name for single file transfers.
  • Any filename may be used for the checkpoint-file.

Bulk Files Transfer Example 

iput -P -b -r -T --retries 3 -X checkpoint-file my-files-to-transfer/

Single Large File Transfer Example 

iput -P -T --retries 3 --lfrestart checkpoint-lf-file my-file-to-transfer.txt