Use HSI to access your SDA account at IU

• HSI at IU
• HSI commands
• Alternative authentication methods
• Get help

HSI at IU

The Hierarchical Storage Interface (HSI) application provides a convenient command-line interface for securely transferring files to and from High Performance Storage System (HPSS) resources, such as Indiana University's Scholarly Data Archive (SDA).

HSI is available on the IU research supercomputers. To use HSI, add it to your user environment by loading the hpss module; on the command line, enter:

module load hpss

HSI commands

HSI commands are similar to SFTP commands and should seem familiar to Linux users. For details about HSI commands and command-line options, see the HSI Reference Manual.

An HSI session might look similar to the following, for example (% is the shell prompt, and ? is the HSI prompt):

% hsi
Principal: jdoe
[jdoe]Password:
Username: jdoe  UID: 11021  CC: 11021 Copies: 1 [hsi.6.2.0.p3 Fri Jul 26 09:49:16 EDT 2019]

? ls
/hpss/j/d/jdoe/:
NPB-ppcc.tar   foobar/        movies/

? du -k
861309  /hpss/j/d/jdoe/
-----------------------
861309  total 1024-byte blocks, 6 Files (881,979,719 bytes)

? put myfile1.dat
put myfile1.dat : /hpss/j/d/jdoe/myfile.dat ( 10485760 bytes,
12283.4 KBS (cos=3))

? cd movies
? get myfile2.mov
Scheduler: retrieving file(s)
get myfile2.mov : /hpss/j/d/jdoe/movies/myfile2.dat
(2010/09/29 08:49:03 10485760 bytes, 16842.8 KBS )

? exit

Alternative authentication methods

By default, HSI will prompt for login information (known in HSI as the "combo" authentication method). Alternatively, if your binaries are built with the appropriate method, you can enable authentication based on either existing Kerberos credentials (known as the "Kerberos" method) or Kerberos keytabs (known as the "keytab" method) using one of the following options.

• On the command line, invoke hsi with the -A option; for example:
  • To enable the "kerberos" authentication method, enter:

    hsi -A kerberos

  • To explicitly enable the "combo" authentication method, enter:

    hsi -A combo

  • To enable the "keytab" authentication method, you also must include the -k option to specify the path to your keytab file (for example, /path/to/my_keytab) and the -l option to specify the appropriate login name (for example, username):

    hsi -A keytab -k /path/to/my_keytab -l username

• Create a private HSI startup file (~/.hsirc) that contains the authmethod parameter. Create this file in your home directory on the system you use to connect to the SDA; do not create or store this file in your SDA home directory. Add the authmethod parameter line as follows:
  • To enable the "kerberos" authentication method, add:

    authmethod = kerberos

  • To explicitly enable the "combo" authentication method, add:

    authmethod = combo

  • To enable the "keytab" method, your private HSI startup file also must contain the keytab parameter to specify the path to your keytab file (for example, /path/to/my_keytab) and the principal parameter to specify the appropriate login name (for example, username):

    authmethod = keytab
    principal = username
    keytab = /path/to/my_keytab

• Define the HPSS_AUTH_METHOD environment variable; for example:
  • In the csh or tcsh shell:
    • To enable the "kerberos" authentication method, enter:

      setenv HPSS_AUTH_METHOD kerberos

    • To explicitly enable the "combo" authentication method, enter:

      setenv HPSS_AUTH_METHOD combo

    • To enable the "keytab" authentication method, you also must define the HPSS_KEYTAB_PATH environment variable with the path to your keytab file (for example, path/to/my_keytab) and the HPSS_PRINCIPAL environment variable with the appropriate login name (for example, username):

      setenv HPSS_PRINCIPAL username
      setenv HPSS_AUTH_METHOD keytab
      setenv HPSS_KEYTAB_PATH /path/to/my_keytab

  • In the ksh or bash shell:
    • To enable the "kerberos" authentication method, enter:

      export HPSS_AUTH_METHOD=kerberos

    • To explicitly enable the "combo" authentication method, enter:

      export HPSS_AUTH_METHOD=combo

    • To enable the "keytab" authentication method, you also must define the HPSS_KEYTAB_PATH environment variable with the path to your keytab file (for example, path/to/my_keytab) and the HPSS_PRINCIPAL environment variable with the appropriate login name (for example, username):

      export HPSS_PRINCIPAL=username
      export HPSS_AUTH_METHOD=keytab
      export HPSS_KEYTAB_PATH=/path/to/my_keytab

Get help

If you encounter a problem or have questions about using HSI to access your SDA account, email the UITS Research Storage team (store-admin@iu.edu).