Athena is an academic computing environment provided to the MIT community in the form of remote access servers (known as the “dialups”), a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI), and Pharos, a hold-and-release service for printers distributed across campus.
Benefits and key features
- Kerberos authentication and OpenAFS
- Access to MIT ‘lockers’ and your Athena home directory on the AFS filesystem
- Access to a collection of common utilities and MIT-licensed software
- Centrally-managed printers
The Athena Dialups service (athena.dialup.mit.edu) provides all MIT community members with access via a secure shell on one of a pool of servers running Ubuntu (currently 18.0.4 LTS).
Beginning in fall 2021, the Virtual Athena Desktop service will provide students with access to these features in a graphical user interface via the VMWare Horizon client. Virtual Athena Desktops are available for temporary, first-come, first-serve use. Note that this service is currently in beta, so availability may be limited if usage exceeds expectations.
- Virtual Athena Desktops feature 2 CPUs, 8 GB RAM, and 50 GB local disk, running Ubuntu 18.0.4 LTS
- Available to students only during this beta period
- Sessions may not exceed 24 hours
- Virtual machines are deleted and refreshed after 24 hours
Requirements
- MIT Kerberos user account
- Connection via MITnet on campus or via the MIT remote access VPN
Getting started
- Get started with Athena in the Knowledge Base
- Using MIT’s Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) in the Knowledge Base
- Access a Virtual Athena Desktop: vdi.mit.edu (Touchstone login and MITnet connection or VPN required)
- Access the Athena dialups
- Use Pharos printing