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Contributed Applications

Contributed Web-based Applications on CANFAR

🎯 What You'll Learn

  • How to launch contributed applications on CANFAR
  • Where your data is stored and how to save results
  • How to contribute your own web application
  • Troubleshooting common issues

Contributed applications are specialised, community-developed web tools that expand CANFAR's capabilities. They integrate with CANFAR storage and authentication, are web-based for easy collaboration, and require no local installation. The catalogue of available applications evolves as the community contributes new tools.

Suggest New Applications

Have an idea for a new application? Jump on discord, or contact support@canfar.net to discuss it.

🚀 Getting Started

  1. Log into the CANFAR Science Portal, click + to create a new session, and select contributed.
  2. Choose an application from the dropdown menu.
  3. Give your session a descriptive name and click "Launch."

Your application will start in 30-90 seconds.

Data Persistence

Contributed applications can access your files at /arc/projects/[project]/ and /arc/home/[user]/. Always save important results to these paths, as other locations may not persist.

Currently Available Applications:

  • marimo (skaha/marimo:latest): Reactive Python notebooks for reproducible analysis.
  • VSCode on Browser (skaha/vscode:latest): A browser-based development environment for collaborative projects (based on Visual Studio Code).

🧑‍💻 Contributing Your App

If you have a containerized web application, you can contribute it to the platform. The main requirements are that your application must expose a web interface on port 5000 and include a startup script at /skaha/startup.sh.

For detailed instructions, see the Container Development guide. We recommend contacting support@canfar.net to discuss your idea before you start.

🆘 Troubleshooting

  • Application doesn't load: If your session doesn't start after 90 seconds, try a hard refresh of your browser page.
  • Data access issues: These usually stem from incorrect file paths or permissions. Verify you are using the correct paths and have the necessary permissions.

🔗 What's Next?

To make the most of contributed applications, match the right tool to your workflow. Explore each application's capabilities and consider combining them with other CANFAR services like Batch Processing for more powerful analysis. The Storage Guide will help you effectively manage your data.