# Mate Desktop in a Singularity container?

**URL:** <https://discourse.openondemand.org/t/mate-desktop-in-a-singularity-container/696>\
**Category:** Get Help\
**Tags:** question\
**Created:** [January 29, 2020, 4:38pm UTC](https://discourse.openondemand.org/t/mate-desktop-in-a-singularity-container/696 "2020-01-29T16:38:31Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Showing post:** 40

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![novosirj](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex015/user_avatar/discourse.openondemand.org/novosirj/32/339_2.png) [@novosirj](https://discourse.openondemand.org/u/novosirj)\
**Post date:** [September 1, 2021, 8:31pm UTC](https://discourse.openondemand.org/t/mate-desktop-in-a-singularity-container/696/40 "2021-09-01T20:31:43Z")

</div>

I’m finally coming back to this, and I’m quite sure that I’m close but still not able to make it work. I don’t think I’m totally clear which piece runs where, between the OnDemand server, the compute node, and then the compute node inside of Singularity.

We have our image on a shared filesystem that is mounted on both the OnDemand server and all compute nodes, and both `websockify` and `vncpasswd`/`vncserver` are also on this shared filesystem. They’re not in the Singularity image at all.

Here’s my form, in /etc/ood/config/apps/bc\_desktop:

```auto
title: "Amarel Desktop"
cluster: "amarel"
submit: submit/container.yml.erb
attributes:
  desktop: "mate"
  bc_vnc_idle: 0
  bc_vnc_resolution:
    required: true
  node_type: null
  memory_gigs:
    widget: "number_field"
    label: "Gigabytes of memory"
    value: 4
    help: |
      Number of gigabytes of memory (larger values may mean longer wait)
    min: 1
    max: 100
    step: 1

form:
  - bc_vnc_idle
  - desktop
# - bc_account
  - bc_num_hours
# - bc_num_slots
  - num_cores
  - memory_gigs
  - node_type
  - bc_queue
  - bc_vnc_resolution
  - bc_email_on_started
  - reservation

```

And then here’s my submit/container.yml.erb:

```auto
<%
  image="/projects/community/containers/mate_desktop_v2.img"
%>
---
script:
  native:
    - "-c"
    - "<%= num_cores.blank? ? 1 : num_cores.to_i %>"
    - "--mem=<%= memory_gigs %>G"
  template: "vnc"
batch_connect:
  websockify_cmd: '/projects/community/containers/bin/websockify'
  script_wrapper: |
    cat << "CTRSCRIPT" > container.sh
    export PATH="$PATH:/projects/community/containers/bin"
    module purge
    module load singularity
    %s  
    CTRSCRIPT

    module purge
    module load singularity

    export SINGULARITY_BINDPATH="/run/munge:/run/munge,/tmp/$ID:/run/user,/projects,/scratch,/cache/sw:/opt/sw,/cache,/cache/home:/home,/projectsp,/projectsn,/projectsc,/etc/slurm"

    singularity exec <%= image %> /bin/bash container.sh

```

What I get with this setup is something I don’t understand in `output.log`:

```auto
Setting VNC password...
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0mStarting VNC server...
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0me[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m
Cleaning up...
e[91mERROR : Failed to set effective UID to 0
e[0m

```

This appears to be Singularity saying this, but I don’t totally understand it.

If I remove `module purge; module load singularity` from the line above `%s`, I get the below in `output.log`:

```auto
Setting VNC password...
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncpasswd: line 3: singularity: command not found
Starting VNC server...
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found
/projects/community/containers/bin/vncserver: line 3: singularity: command not found

```

If I put it back but instead remove it from below `CTRSCRIPT`, I get the following in `output.log`:

```auto
/var/lib/slurm/slurmd/job14618206/slurm_script: line 216: singularity: command not found

```

I’m not totally sure what is happening. I’d appreciate any pointers you might be able to provide.

---

_[View the full topic](https://discourse.openondemand.org/t/mate-desktop-in-a-singularity-container/696)._