Ananke Jupyter Distribution

The Ananke project provides preconfigured JupyterHub images for Podman (a Docker-like containerization tool) with a focus on integrating JupyterLab and nbgrader into learning management systems (LMS) like Moodle, Canvas and many others.

The project's core is the Kore service providing GUI-based course management and an LTI 1.3 interface for nbgrader.

Target group are administrators of small to medium-sized JupyterHubs used in teaching environments with a handful of courses. The project's focus is not on large-scale JupyterHubs with thousands of users but on:

• easy setup and operation for instructors and students,
• advice and preconfiguration for administrators,
• flexibility to implement different application scenarios.

Also have a look at Ananke website.

Overall architecture

The structure of an Ananke-based JupyterHub deployment is as follows:

• A host machine runs one or several Podman containers.
• Each container represents one JupyterHub, which may be used by a whole university or a department or by only one instructor depending on individual configuration needs.
• Each JupyterHub provides individual JupyterLabs for all its users (instructors and students).

Available container images

The Ananke project uses Podman for containerization. Podman is free, open source, and compatible with Docker. There are several reasons to choose Podman over Docker, the biggest being security-related (rootless containers, daemon-less).

The Ananke project provides the following container images:

• ananke-base (JupyterHub with LTI login and nbgitpuller)
• ananke-nbgrader (like ananke-base plus LTI integrated nbgrader)

Documentation

See doc subdirectory. There's also an HTML rendering of the doc.

Quickstart

Here are the major steps to get your own JupyterHub with LMS integration:

1. Get a server with Debian Linux (other distros should work, too).
2. Download or build an Ananke Podman image.
3. Choose a configuration template.
4. Create a container.
5. Configure your LMS.

See documentation for detailled install instructions.

Contact and contributors

The Ananke project started as a joint project of Leipzig University of Applied Sciences and Zwickau University of Applied Sciences.

The project team currently consists of:

• Jens Flemming
• Konrad Schöbel
• Marcus Wittig