OpenStack Technical Support
Technical Support for accessing and using the SCS OpenStack Cloud:

Support comes in the form of step-by-step guides and single-topic technical support articles.
Additional information may be provided by your Supervisor, Instructor, Lab Coordinator or TA. If you have any questions, please follow instructions for getting in person support.
Table of Contents
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Login Credentials: Most of our OpenStack images share the same default credentials:
username: student
password: studentIMPORTANT: New images since (2022/2023) force a password change on the first login.
First Login Scenarios:- TurboVNC WARNING: TurboVNC does NOT support first login password changes, so your first login must use another login tool below
- vscode WARNING: vscode does NOT support first login password changes, so your first login must use another login tool below
- ssh terminal (putty, etc) first login: When you login, you will be redirect to a change password prompt. You will then have to enter the current password (student) again, and then enter your new password twice. When you change your password, it will then log you out and you have to login again with that new password
- x2go first login: When you login, you will be redirect to a change password prompt. You will then have to enter the current password (student) again, and then enter your new password twice. When you change your password, it will then prompt you to click reconnect, at which point you can login again using the new password
- openstack web console first login: When you login, you will be redirect to a change password prompt. You will then have to enter the current password (student) again, and then enter your new password twice. In this case, you stay connected. The next time you login, you will need the new password
WARNING: If you are using an older image (pre-2022) that does not enforce an ssh key or a password change, then we strongly encourage you to immediately change your password or setup an ssh key!
OpenStack Step-by-Step Guide
This Step-by-Step guide uses videos and text tutorials to take you through all the basic steps for accessing OpenStack and setting up and using its resources.
OpenStack User Guides
A list of guides that are commonly helpful to users of the SCS OpenStack. Many of these guides may also be useful to you in other computing scenarios.
- Transferring Files Between Virtual Machines
Different methods to transfer files to and from virtual machines, including OpenStack instances. - Connecting Without Passwords
Set up an SSH Key Pair to authenticate with Linux servers. - Using SSH Keys to Support Multi-node Compute Tools
Set up an SSH Key Pair and environment to support automated scripts and high-performance computing tools in a multi-node environment. - Extend LVM Disk Space on an instance
How to extend the size of your instance’s disk space (Only if you are using a flavor that allocates more disk space than was available on the original image). - Using a Custom Image on the SCS OpenStack
How to customize your own image on the SCS OpenStack, or have a custom one uploaded for you (if required) - MPI User Guide:
A user guide for MPI programming that is also useful for other multi-node OpenStack applications: OpenStack_MPI_2018-09-18.pdf
(This MPI.zip file provides sample code that can be used to test your MPI setup)
General Troubleshooting and User Guides
This list is an aggregation of many user guides and troubleshooting articles covering a wide array of topics. If you cannot find the information you need in the above sections, one of these articles might be helpful.
Tagged Support Articles
This is a list of tagged technical support articles that may provide additional support (automatically generated). Some of them are directly related to OpenStack, but others are related to topics that may be relevant depending on what you are using the OpenStack resources (course work, research projects, etc.).
- OpenStack tagged support articles
- Virtual Machine tagged support articles
- Linux tagged support articles
Preparing an Openstack Instance Support Request
- Prepare an Openstack Instance Support Request
This article will provide information on how to prepare an email support request for Openstack instance related issues
Request Non-Course OpenStack Resources (Instances)
In some cases you may want to request openstack resources for non-course related reasons, such as for honours projects, research, student group resources, etc. These forms can be used to submit those requests. In most cases you will require an SCS Faculty member to sponsor the request.
DEPRECATED OpenStack User Guides
Some deprecated guides will be referenced here while they may still be useful to some users:
- General How-To Document: This How-To document provides some more detailed information on using the SCS OpenStack:
OpenStack_Introduction_HowTo_2018-09-11.pdf