GUI Programs

Here you will find the information necessary to configure and run graphical user interface (GUI) applications on HiPerGator. The process is not complicated, but running a GUI on a remote server and displaying the windows on your local client computer with a sufficiently responsive interface is not as easy as simply running the application locally.

X11 Forwarding

For the simplest case of running a lightweight GUI application for a very short time you can log into HiPerGator with

ssh -Y MYUSER@hpg.rc.ufl.edu

Load the environment module your application is in and run it. Do not analyze data this way, but running a text editor, a web browser to log in and get an api token from a remote service or some other very short and lightweight operations are fine.

Open OnDemand

Open OnDemand Service is based on the Open OnDemand software, which provides a web-only interface to starting and attaching to GUI programs with seamless connections through web browsers.

Using Open on Demand on HiPerGator

1. Go to https://ood.rc.ufl.edu/
2. Launch a terminal
3. Launch many graphical applications like Rstudio, Matlab and Freeview
4. Manage job submission
5. Upload, download and edit files via your browser

See Running Graphical Applications on HiPerGator for a video tutorial.