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Resources for Open Forest Observatory workshop at FOSS4G NA

9 AM - 12 PM, Monday, November 2, 2026 @ Bondi Room, Downtown Sheraton Grand, Sacramento, CA

Workshop overview

The workshop will walk you through two Open Forest Observatory tutorials:

We will provide demonstrations and additional context around each task. We encourage you to bring your own laptop and follow along in running the tools yourself.

Computing options

There are two options:

  1. Remote cloud computing environment: We will provide a remote cloud computing environment for the workshop, preloaded with all the necessary data and software. You will be able to access this environment from your own laptop via ssh (instructions provided).
  2. Local compute on your laptop: We provide instructions for running the tools locally, but you will need to install the necessary software and download the data to your laptop in advance. See Advance preparation, below, for details.

Input data

The preparation instructions below assume you will be using the OFO tutorials demo dataset. You are also welcome to bring your own data (particularly orthomosaics or canopy height models). Many of the examples can be easily adapted to other datasets.

Advance preparation

Required preparation depends on how you plan to run the software (remotely or locally).

Everyone

Install a graphical GIS software like QGIS to inspect data inputs and outputs.

Remote computing environment

If you plan to use the remote computing environment we will provide, you must have at least one of the following installed on your laptop:

Local computing environment

If you plan to run the OFO tools on your laptop, you must download the workshop example data (~6 GB) and prepare to run either Docker containers or Conda environments. Due to expected slow connection speeds at the venue, you will need to download the Docker images or Conda libraries in advance (~20 GB). Follow the OFO tutorial preparation instructions for all setup in advance of the workshop.

Using the remote computing environment

You will be assigned a username like user01. We will provide you with the password during the workshop. The remote machine (VM) is at IP address 149.165.169.185.

Connecting

Terminal

To connect to the VM, in a terminal run:

ssh YOUR_USERNAME@149.165.169.185

Then enter the password.

VS Code

Alternatively, in VS Code, click the "><" icon in the lower left corner, select "Connect to Host...", click "+ Add New SSH Host", and enter:

ssh YOUR_USERNAME@149.165.169.185

Press Enter again to save to the default SSH config file. Then (and for all future connections) just click the "><" icon, select "Connect to Host...", and select the host you just added. Enter the password when prompted.

Data

The tutorial demo data lives at ~/ofo-tutorial-data on the VM. The subfolders are all read-only because they are shared across all users. The exception is ~/ofo-tutorial-data/output, which is unique to you and begins empty. We recommend saving your outputs to this folder. All examples here and in the tutorials assume you will be saving to this folder.

Transferring files from the remote VM to your laptop

Terminal

To transfer files from the VM to your laptop, open a new terminal window and use the scp command. For example, to copy everything in the ~/ofo-tutorial-data/output VM folder to ~/ofo-tutorial-data/output on your local machine, run:

scp -r YOUR_USERNAME@149.165.169.185:~/ofo-tutorial-data/output ~/ofo-tutorial-data/output

To transfer a single file, run:

scp YOUR_USERNAME@149.165.169.185:~/ofo-tutorial-data/output/EXAMPLE_FILE.txt ~/ofo-tutorial-data/output/

VS Code

After connecting to the VM, click the "Open Folder" button in the left sidebar and select the folder ofo-tutorial-data and click "OK". You can then use the VS Code file explorer in the left pane, and right-click on any file or folder to download it to your local machine.