Using PlanetLab

We at PlanetLab welcome users from around the world to run experiments on our nodes.

Become a user

Anyone can create a PlanetLab account. Just go to the console, register, and agree to the acceptable use policy.

To use your account to deploy containerized software to the nodes, you need approval, which can be obtained in one of two ways:

  • Be vouched for. Ask an existing user in a position of responsibility who knows you to invite you to their team and/or one of their workspaces via the console
  • Request your own team. If you are in a position to be a team leader (see next section), use the console to request that PlanetLab management make you manager of a team.

Registering with your institutional e-mail address can simplify the approval process.

Users of the European Union’s SLICES-RI portal who have been approved there are automatically authorized to use PlanetLab, and simply need to authenticate via the “Login with Slices” button on our console.

Create a team

PlanetLab welcomes university professors, instructors who wish to use the platform for laboratory exercises for their classes, researchers from not-for-profit institutions, and members of public and industry research laboratories, and others. Industry use is limited to pre-commercial purposes.

If you are in one of these categories and would like access to PlanetLab for yourself and others with whom you work, become a PlanetLab user and, within the console, request the creation of a team. PlanetLab administrators will verify the information that you provide. Once approved, you will be able to ask people to become users of your team, approve or reject team membership requests, and manage workspaces (see next section).

As a team manager, you do not need to be familiar with Docker or Kubernetes. You can manage your team entirely via the web console.

Deploy via a workspace

All work is done in workspaces that are created via the console. These correspond to Kubernetes namespaces, and, once a workspace has been created, users employ the familiar kubectl command-line tool and YAML configuration files to deploy and manage their containerized software.