Let's see if we can get some compute credits for students

[stephencwelch]

It would be terrific if we could provide compute credits on Azure, AWS, Digital Ocean, or GCE to students to use for the course. I've been asking around the university and some of my Azure contacts, but not luck yet. @telidevaravind and @RohanBhosale4229, can you help me do some research here to try to find potential avenues for this?

[telidevaravind]

Our university provides MAMBA for students' assignments. Here is the link: https://urc.uncc.edu/educational-clusters/mamba-user-notes Personally, I had never used it in any of my coursework but will enquire about it.

We were given 100 credits on AWS for our ITCS / DSBA 6190 Cloud Computing for Data Analysis class. May be, CCI can help us in getting a few credits to our students.

[RohanBhosale4229]

AWS SageMaker provides some free tier credits for students which is 250Hrs per month for 2 months. Also Azure is providing 12 months free account which provides 5,000 transactions for AI and Machine Learning.

[swelchm]

I asked around CCI a little, here's a few responses that I received:

I followed up with Wlodek.

[swelchm]

@telidevaravind, who taught your ITCS / DSBA 6190 Cloud Computing for Data Analysis class?

[telidevaravind]

@swelchm Dr. Angelina Tzacheva taught us cloud computing class professor.

[RohanBhosale4229]

Professor, a student from course KBS by Prof. Pamela Thompson said that they were given few credits for GCE by prof. Pamela Thompson.
Also, When we sign up on GCE for the first time, Google is giving a $300 credit free trial.

[stephencwelch]

Here's some more info from Wlodek:

HI Stephen, Google had a form online, same for Azure. AWS -- my students asked, and they simply granted some credits to them. Here's google link: https://edu.google.com/programs/faculty/benefits/?modal_active=none The query was: google academic research grants It should work for others as well. Cheers,

[stephencwelch]

@telidevaravind, @RohanBhosale4229 - will you try to find this online Azure form that Wlodek is talking about, and look into the google one?

[RohanBhosale4229]

yes professor, we' ll try and find that form.

[RohanBhosale4229]

@stephencwelch - Professor, I checked for Azure on the site it says that " students will get a $100 credit when you create your free Azure for Students account", "No credit card needed", Students will have to verify their status through a University email ID. Below is the link for the same.

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/students/#free-products-section

And the tools provided by this account to students are given here:

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/students/#free-products-section

Although it says that if students have to pay for Azure resources used while training they will have $100 credit provided by Azure.

Also by the query provided, I found this form: https://edu.google.com/programs/credits/research/?modal_active=none

[swelchm]

Terrific! Next steps:

1. I will fill out the google form.
2. @telidevaravind and @RohanBhosale4229 please try out the Azure student deal with your uncc email, and confirm that you can instantiate and ssh into an NC6 GPU machine. If this works, please create step-by-step instructions for students to follow (using a markdown file and screenshots) and upload to this repo.

Thanks!

[stephencwelch]

Hey @telidevaravind and @RohanBhosale4229 - any updates here?

[telidevaravind]

We have successfully logged into our azure account (used a personal existing account or created a new one) and verified our school by entering our school email ID after which we were credited with 100$ with 1-year validity. After that, we have created a virtual machine with the following details: VM size: NC6_Promo Family: GPU vCPUs: 6 RAM(GiB): 56 Data disks: 24 Max IOPS: 20000 Temp storage: 380 Premium Disk: Supported Cost/hour: $0.3960

Next, I have completed the set up of the virtual machine and started using it with PuTTY in my local machine.

[http://web.stanford.edu/class/cs234/assignment2/CS234%20Azure%20Setup.pdf] - This link helped me to set up the virtual machine (although it is not exactly the same.)

Please let me know what you think. If everything is perfect, I shall start writing the step by step instructions for the same as you instructed professor.

I have attached the screenshots of the same for your reference.

[stephencwelch]

Excellent - yes, please create some instructions for students to follow and push to this repo.

[telidevaravind]

Hello Professor,

I have created a google document that has detailed instructions on how to create a VM and configure it. I have already shared it with you. Here is the link for the same: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1q8pPkX9_UFQxBULWK1J8OR7Q1BTWPXlzqLlZzszlo_s/edit?usp=sharing

Currently, we are dealing with how to install CUDA and other necessary drivers to run the deep learning models successfully. Once we are done figuring it out, we shall add those instructions as well and push it here.

[swelchm]

Great, just reviewed - looks like you're off to a great start!

[stephencwelch]

• Aravind still needs to work on setting up driver and such.