🚀 Data Proxy Service (data-stream)

A Python-based tool that allows you to stream data from a remote server to your local compute resources. This service is particularly useful when you need to train models on large datasets stored on a remote server but don't have sufficient storage on your local compute node.

This repository is a wrapper around the sshtunnel library and uses fastapi to create a simple HTTP server to stream the data.

✨ Features

• 🔒 Stream data securely from a remote server using SSH tunneling
• 📝 Support for SSH config aliases and direct SSH parameters
• ⚡ FastAPI-powered HTTP endpoint for data access
• 🤖 Automatic management of remote Python HTTP server
• 🏥 Health check endpoint for monitoring
• 🔑 Support for both SSH key and password authentication
• ⚙️ Configurable ports for local and remote connections
• 🛑 Graceful shutdown handling

📦 Installation

Install the package using pip:

pip install data-streaming

Alternatively, Clone this repository:

   git clone https://github.com/yourusername/data-proxy-service.git
   cd data-proxy-service
   pip install -e .

🔧 Usage: Command-line Interface

To start the Data Proxy Service, use one of the following methods:

1. Using SSH Config Alias 📋

If you have an SSH config file (~/.ssh/config) with your server details:

data-stream --ssh-host-alias myserver --data-path /path/to/remote/data

Here is an example of an SSH config file:

Host myserver
    HostName example.com
    User mouloud
    IdentityFile ~/.ssh/id_rsa

2. Using Direct SSH Parameters 🔑

data-stream \
  --ssh-host example.com \
  --ssh-username myusername \
  --ssh-key-path ~/.ssh/id_rsa \
  --data-path /path/to/remote/data

Optional Parameters ⚙️

• --local-port: Local port for SSH tunnel (default: 8000)
• --remote-port: Remote port for HTTP server (default: 8001)
• --fastapi-port: FastAPI server port (default: 5001)
• --ssh-password: SSH password (if not using key-based authentication)

Example with all parameters:

data-stream \
  --ssh-host example.com \
  --ssh-username john \
  --data-path /home/john/datasets \
  --ssh-key-path ~/.ssh/id_rsa \
  --local-port 8000 \
  --remote-port 8001 \
  --fastapi-port 5000

3.Using Environment Variables 🔧

You can also configure the service using environment variables:

• PROXY_SSH_HOST_ALIAS: SSH host alias (for SSH config)
• PROXY_SSH_HOST: SSH host (cluster 1)
• PROXY_SSH_USERNAME: SSH username
• PROXY_DATA_PATH: Path to data on cluster 1
• PROXY_SSH_KEY_PATH: Path to SSH key
• PROXY_SSH_PASSWORD: SSH password (if not using key)
• PROXY_LOCAL_PORT: Local port for SSH tunnel
• PROXY_REMOTE_PORT: Remote port for HTTP server
• PROXY_FASTAPI_PORT: FastAPI server port

🖥️ HPC Usage

When using data-stream on an HPC (High-Performance Computing) system:

⚠️ Important: Always start the service on a compute node, not on the login node. Login nodes are shared resources and aren't suitable for running services.

Example using SLURM:

#!/bin/bash
#SBATCH --job-name=data-stream
#SBATCH --nodes=1
#SBATCH --ntasks=1
#SBATCH --cpus-per-task=1
#SBATCH --mem=4G
#SBATCH --time=24:00:00

data-stream \
  --ssh-host-alias myserver \
  --data-path /path/to/remote/data

📊 Integration Examples

WebDataset Integration 📦

data-stream works seamlessly with WebDataset for efficient data loading in machine learning pipelines:

import webdataset as wds
from torch.utils.data import DataLoader

# Start data-stream service (as shown above)

# Create WebDataset pipeline
dataset = wds.WebDataset('http://localhost:5000/data/path/to/tarfiles/{000000..999999}.tar')

# Create DataLoader
dataloader = DataLoader(dataset, batch_size=None, num_workers=4)

# Use in training
for batch_input, batch_target in dataloader:
    # Your training code here
    pass

📂 Accessing Data

Once the service is running, you can access your data through:

http://localhost:5000/data/path/to/file

You can test the data stream by running:

curl http://localhost:5000/health/shard_0001.tar -o test.tar

🏥 Health Check

You can verify the service status using:

curl http://localhost:5000/health

This will return:

{
  "status": "OK",
  "connection": {
    "hostname": "example.com",
    "username": "myusername",
    "using_ssh_config": true
  }
}

🐍 Using as a Python Package

You can also use data-stream in your Python code:

from data_stream import DataProxyService, Settings

# Using SSH config alias
settings = Settings(
    ssh_host_alias="myserver",
    data_path="/path/to/remote/data"
)

# Or using direct parameters
settings = Settings(
    ssh_host="example.com",
    ssh_username="myusername",
    ssh_key_path="~/.ssh/id_rsa",
    data_path="/path/to/remote/data"
)

# Initialize and start the service
service = DataProxyService(settings)
await service.start()

# When done
await service.stop()

📋 Requirements

• Python 3.7+
• SSH access to the remote server
• Python installation on the remote server

🔧 Troubleshooting

Common Issues

1. 🚫 Permission Denied

   • Verify your username and SSH key are correct
   • Check if your user has access to the data directory on the remote server

2. ⚠️ Port Already in Use

   • Try different ports using --local-port, --remote-port, or --fastapi-port
   • Check if another instance of data-stream is already running
   • On HPC, ensure no other jobs are using the same ports (that why it important to run on the compute node)

3. 🔌 Remote Server Issues

   • Ensure Python is installed on the remote server
   • Check if the data path exists and is accessible

📄 License

This project is licensed under the MIT License - see the LICENSE file for details.