Troubleshooting

If your DataLab account name is not recognised by your authenticator application

There are many different authentication applications, ensure the one you have downloaded is published by Microsoft (not Google or otherwise). The ABS DataLab only supports Microsoft Authenticator.

The following authenticator applications (similar in appearance to the Microsoft Authenticator) will not function with the ABS DataLab:

If you have verified you are utilising the correct application, but are not receiving prompts to authenticate on your mobile device

If using an Android device, check your battery optimisation is turned OFF by following these steps. Open Microsoft Authenticator, and refer to the top right-hand corner, if there is a red dot above the three white dots, press this and then select 'Allow' to turn the battery optimisation off. Then try logging in again on the DataLab landing page.

You can also try to switch from wifi to mobile data through your phone, to ensure a good connection to your PC/laptop.

If you receive the ‘Error communicating with server’ message on your mobile device

If your device is connected to the home WiFi, then please turn your phone over to mobile data and try logging in again.

If switching to a new phone/tablet device

The operating system of some mobile devices may not interact as expected with Microsoft Authenticator (namely the iOS 16, and some older versions of Android), in this case, try setup another phone or tablet device.

In the case that you still have your old phone it may help if the old account is removed from the Microsoft Authenticator application on the previous device.

• If you have entered your user name or password using copy and paste, you may have accidentally included hidden characters or a space.
• Your organisation firewall may be blocking access. Try accessing DataLab while disconnected from your organisation's network.
• The ABS DataLab only supports use of the Microsoft Authenticator app.
• If you have changed your mobile phone we need to reset your Microsoft Multi Factor Authentication. Email data.services@abs.gov.au.
• If you need to reset your password this must be done via the Forgot my password link in the initial DataLab sign in screen.
• Clear your browser cache.
• Try a different browser. See Recommended browsers.

DataLab is enabled by cloud infrastructure, which may be blocked by some organisations’ firewall settings.

ABS cannot make changes to external organisations' infrastructure. Project Leads need to supply the information below to each organisation participating on this project.

Network/IT Security sections in each organisation need to review and make changes to authenticate access.

There are 4 steps which need to be applied to each organisation’s security settings before the project start date to enable access to DataLab.

1. Enable authentication to the tenant

Users need to authenticate to one of ABS Azure Active tenants, which may be strictly controlled by government agencies and academic workplaces. Authentication must be enabled to the tenants:

• mydata.abs.gov.au
• absmydata.onmicrosoft.com

2. Allow user access to URLs

Users will need to access the following URLs:

• DataLab production portal: datalab.abs.gov.au and gw.datalab.abs.gov.au
• Citrix portal: absdatalab.cloud.com

3. 2020 version of Citrix Workspace client installed

The originating client machine must have a recent version of the Citrix Workspace client installed. Here is a link to the Citrix Workspace download page

4. Enable HTTPS connections

All Remote Desktop client connections to ABS DataLab go via Citrix Cloud service. Your organisations Network/Security area will need to enable HTTPS connections to the following:

• *.citrix.com
• *.cloud.com
• *.nssvc.net

Organisations that can't enable all subdomains can whitelist using wildcards to prevent future connectivity issues to Citrix. For more information refer to Citrix Product Documentation.

The DataLab has more functionality and features available to you, so you can set options as well as undertake your research.

• First log-in is to the DataLab portal, where you can view and set options for your DataLab account information and virtual machines. Read more in DataLab portal features.
• Second log-in is to the DataLab workspace where you undertake your analysis.

• The temporary password issued to you by the ABS lasts for 90 days. After you have completed the set up steps you must reset your password.
• If you have forgotten your temporary password, email data.services@abs.gov.au for a reset.

Your log in credentials for the DataLab portal are the same as for the DataLab workspace. You can reset your password by clicking on the Forgot my password link.

Your session will continue on until a shutdown is required (either nightly shutdown or 30 day rebuild). However, you can still reset your password while your session is running.

1. You must Activate, then start the VM. Follow the process and wait for each step to complete before progressing.
2. Check your internet connection. If you have a weak or intermittent connection, this can affect launching your virtual machine.
3. Try launching the virtual machine outside of your organisation's online environment. Some institutions’ or Government departments’ firewall or other security settings may be preventing access to DataLab portal and/or launching of the virtual machine. Attempting to connect outside your agency’s online environment may assist in forming the VM connection.
4. VM not launching can be caused by a Citrix issue. Try again after installing the latest version of Citrix workspace.
5. Restart your virtual machine. As with restarting a computer, restarting your virtual machine can sometimes resolve problems with launching your machine successfully. From the virtual machine page click the Restart VM button and wait 10 minutes to ensure the reboot of the machine is complete before attempting to launch again.
6. If you are still having trouble, email data.services@abs.gov.au.

• Virtual machines, or VMs, are the virtual workspaces you can use to undertake your analysis in the DataLab.
• Virtual machines are called Desktops in the Citrix Portal.
• You have one machine for each project. This is a security measure to prevent data from one project being accessed by another project that the same researcher has access to.
• VMs are created by us as part of the project application process, described in About DataLab.
• You can run analysis on multiple virtual machines at the same time, but only if you have been granted local disk space. See Run jobs on offline VMs (desktops). You may want to request this option if you have multiple projects that you are actively involved in.

We assign what is appropriate for use from the following, mainly driven by the size of the data approved for your project.

• Small (2 core CPU, 8GB memory), intended for supervisors or users who are reviewing code rather than doing their own analysis
• Medium (2 core CPU, 16GB memory)
• Large (2 ‘fast’ core CPU, 64GB memory)

If you are noticing poor performance, please email us via the Contact Us page.

The following larger machines are available by request, however there may be charges associated with these:

• X-Large (4 Core CPU, 128 GB memory)
• XX-Large (32 Core CPU, 256 GB memory)
• XXX-Large (64 Core CPU, 504 GB memory)

If you require a larger machine, you will need to consult your project lead and your project lead will need to send the ABS an updated project proposal. 

If you are a member of multiple projects in the DataLab, you will have more than one virtual machine. Your Active machine is the one that is connected to the remote file share, where the data files are stored. For security purposes, only one of your sessions can connect to the remote file share at a time (this is where data files are stored). You can activate your virtual machine by using the Change Active VM button.

Virtual machines are destroyed approximately every 30 days for security purposes. If the 30 day timing will interfere with the timing of your project, you can choose to destroy and rebuild earlier than 30 days at a time that suits you.

Virtual machine project and output drives are backed up every night and kept for 14 days. Files outside of these drives are not recoverable.

Save your work to your Project or Output drives to ensure that your analysis is not lost. Information saved outside of these drives is destroyed when your machine is rebuilt every 30 days.

Only if you have requested local disk space to be allocated to a machine. This allows you to run jobs on offline VMs.

Try logging out of Citrix, stopping your VM and then begin the Start VM process again. If that does not work, try the rebuild now from your VM management options.

System performance issues can occur for many different reasons, and every issue requires a unique approach to troubleshoot. Many issues can be resolved by attempting one of the following:

• Ensure you have a good internet connection and your Citrix Workspace Application is up-to-date (see here)
• Close and reopen the program you are using, and close any other programs or processes that may be consuming system memory
• Confirm your project drive has available space, if not attempt to free up space
• Refresh your network drives using the icon on the workspace desktop
• Attempt to shutdown or rebuild your virtual machine

If issues persist, email data.services@abs.gov.au for further assistance.

If you cannot see the Library, Project, and Output network drives in File Explorer, go to the desktop and double-click the Refresh Network Drives icon.

Stata error example

This means you have exceeded the memory for your virtual machine.

1. Use an alternative method/program to manipulate or process the dataset. Some processes/programs/methods for working with large datasets are more memory-intensive than others. Try some alternative method to see if it is less system intensive.

• Most statistical software tools are able to filter data as it is imported. If your analysis only needs variables a, b and c from a dataset containing 30 variables, then selecting, filtering or importing only these variables uses less memory.
• If you cannot do this in your software, consider creating a subsetted data file using another tool, such as Python, as the first step of preparing your data for analysis.
• If you are unsure of alternative methods, we recommend discussing with other researchers in your project team who are more familiar with your chosen statistical software. The ABS does not provide advice or training on using the analytical tools provided to you in the DataLab.

2. Email data.services@abs.gov.au to request a larger machine. Larger machines incur higher running costs. With user charging, you may need to consult with your organisation to confirm incurring additional expenses for your project before applying for a larger machine.

Clean up the drive contents, review and delete redundant files to free up space.

Email data.services@abs.gov.au to request a storage increase. There may be a cost associated with this.

You can request input clearance for data, code or files to be loaded to your project, from either another project, or other sources that you hold.

Yes, each virtual machine has R, STATA and Python as default software. SAS  is not automatically provided on all machines but can be requested as it requires a licence to be assigned to your virtual machine. Email data.services@abs.gov.au with your request.

Cluster processing is not currently available. We are developing a Databricks service to provide scalable clustered analytics environment for users.

Yes, it takes about 5 minutes to process the connection. You also need to log out of your virtual machine to allow the system to refresh your session with the new data.

You can extend your session to bypass the nightly shutdown, by one, two or three nights.
 

Use the R Studio Package Manager shortcut on the DataLab virtual machine desktop to check the range of R packages available to you. See Managing your R packages.

If the project you opened was saved with SAS Datalab – [machine name] you are connecting to the local SAS server without a profile. When you try to run the project without selecting a profile the system may present an error message saying "The server "SASMain" is not defined in the current repository". Click though the messages and continue.

1. See Managing your R packages to use the RStudio Package Manager on the desktop.
2. If the packages you need is not listed, email your request to data.services@abs.gov.au

Due to a default setting in Microsoft, the system automatically uses Microsoft Edge to open any PDF file. You can open the PDF file by right-clicking on the file, selecting Open with > Adobe Reader. This launches the file using Adobe Acrobat Reader.