Hi Kartin, If your attendees don't "own" their machines and have to use institutional machines, it's possible that the institution itself will help provide backup machines. At my most recent workshop at the Jackson labs, most if not all laptops are configured by the institution and leading up to the workshop their research IT services install the software required for the workshop. One attendee who had trouble ended up swapping out the machine an hour after we saw the first set of trouble and we got the person caught up. So one option would be to talk to the host institution in advance about machines with anaconda, RStudio, etc and install the required packages.
Also at the beginning of workshops helpers can proactively go around, to confirm python or R versions are up to date, upgrade versions, install packages and use green sticky notes for validated machines. That's nice that you can run RStudio on Windows off of a USB drive. So it looks like you could keep a few of those around just in case. RStudio Server is what we use for our lab computer, but for the free version one may want to look into using a reverse proxy with SSL so that you're not sending unencrypted account logins to the RStudio Server web page. Pariksheet On Sun, Sep 16, 2018 at 2:18 PM Katrin Tirok via discuss < [email protected]> wrote: > Hi all, > > I am thinking about good and easy 'backup' options for R and/or python > that workshop participants could use when they have technical issues with > their computer that take longer to sort out. Most of my previous workshops > ran smoothly, but I remember one workshop with R this year, where we had a > number of problems with packages that did not install or did not load > properly, it was a mix of too old R versions and missing rights on machines. > > In South Africa we have additional challenges, like old and and very slow > computers, which can take minutes to generate a plot in R, or very slow > internet connection, making it difficult to install packages on the fly. > > I just discovered RStudioCloud https://rstudio.cloud > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Frstudio.cloud&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041056605&sdata=YBvBW1l9nmFK462z5ai2UUvalK%2BoAWUNeQ421G%2BcYWs%3D&reserved=0> > providing > full Rstudio setup in the web and the service is offered for free at the > moment. > I also started experimenting with Rstudio Server on my workgroup's server, > however this would only work within my institution. > And I know that under Windows one can run Rstudio from a usb drive ... > > I would like to hear what other people do in such situations ... > > Thanks > > Katrin > *The Carpentries > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcarpentries.topicbox.com%2Flatest&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041066614&sdata=ioTfv9qelvAORh0tU0tHreWEIUcXWRqB%2Bl8m1YBA0no%3D&reserved=0>* > / discuss / see discussions > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcarpentries.topicbox.com%2Fgroups%2Fdiscuss&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041066614&sdata=vGpQJUHPIv9Yw0r%2Bv2p4dXaoN0dhwbInlY7DpQhM2%2B0%3D&reserved=0> > + participants > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcarpentries.topicbox.com%2Fgroups%2Fdiscuss%2Fmembers&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041076619&sdata=tZSawrCsZQwL2JvUufafxhpJaJk3qxSMisRMWR30iF4%3D&reserved=0> > + delivery options > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcarpentries.topicbox.com%2Fgroups%2Fdiscuss%2Fsubscription&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041076619&sdata=J8XeZSUNG6hvWZdrhEN%2FRvPkSeoeg%2BMw%2B9lkgKKAo3E%3D&reserved=0> > Permalink > <https://na01.safelinks.protection.outlook.com/?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcarpentries.topicbox.com%2Fgroups%2Fdiscuss%2FT963f4b806cda01a2-M07cc926167b30ab018eef307&data=02%7C01%7Cpariksheet.nanda%40uconn.edu%7C385dbcfb6b0547781be508d61c00c955%7C17f1a87e2a254eaab9df9d439034b080%7C0%7C0%7C636727187041086629&sdata=OFkdO3XgmcteW75imetnp1eoZJAn7VJBb%2BodBx9V1ww%3D&reserved=0> > ------------------------------------------ The Carpentries: discuss Permalink: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/T963f4b806cda01a2-M9d5587ece06747cc348f5d36 Delivery options: https://carpentries.topicbox.com/groups/discuss/subscription
