Ben Trumbore
Cornell Center for Advanced Computing

Revisions: 8/2022, 10/2019, 9/2018 (original)

When working with High Performance Computing (HPC) resources, users are often required to transfer data and/or code between their own computer and the compute resources. For infrequent transfers and file operations, the Globus web interface provides convenient access to a range of Globus functionality. For many users, the web interface is sufficient to meet all of their Globus needs.

Globus also provides a Command Line Interface (CLI) that allows Globus commands to be invoked on computers that host Globus endpoints. These commands can also be included in scripts that perform experiments on TACC resources. Scripting Globus commands can be advantageous when:

  • a large number of files are being transferred
  • multiple Globus endpoints are being used
  • a series of transfers will be repeated frequently

Such scripts can be invoked easily instead of performing all of the individual Globus operations separately.

The coming pages provide examples of using the Globus CLI in the context of working with TACC resources, while the Globus site provides more general CLI documentation. In the description of each command you will find a link to the Globus manual page for that command.

Note that this tutorial describes the newer Python-based Globus CLI, not the legacy "Hosted" Globus CLI, which is no longer supported.

Objectives

After you complete this section, you should be able to:

  • List the advantages of using the Globus command line interface
  • Demonstrate one of the options for installing and testing the Globus CLI
  • Demonstrate logging on to the Globus CLI
  • Describe the Globus CLI command structure
  • Demonstrate specifying endpoints
  • Explain how to deactivate an endpoint
  • List the file and folder commands used with the Globus CLI
  • Distinguish between the single target and batch Globus CLI transfer commands
  • Explain the Globus CLI task commands
Prerequisites
 
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