Migrate data to a new user-managed notebooks instance

Vertex AI Workbench user-managed notebooks is deprecated . On January 30, 2025, support for user-managed notebooks will end and the ability to create user-managed notebooks instances will be removed. Existing instances will continue to function but patches, updates, and upgrades won't be available. To continue using Vertex AI Workbench, we recommend that you migrate your user-managed notebooks instances to Vertex AI Workbench instances .

This page describes how to migrate data and files from an existing user-managed notebooks instance to a new one.

When to migrate

You might need to migrate your data to a new user-managed notebooks instance if you can't upgrade the environment of your existing instance. See the requirements for upgrading the environment of a user-managed notebooks instance .

Migration options

To migrate data and files from one user-managed notebooks instance to another, consider using the following methods:

  • Use GitHub: Copy your data and files to a GitHub repository by using the Git extension for JupyterLab. To use this method, see Save a notebook to GitHub .

  • Use Cloud Storage and the terminal: Copy your data and files to Cloud Storage and then to another instance by using the terminal.

  • Use Cloud Storage within JupyterLab notebooks: Copy your data and files to Cloud Storage and then to another instance by running commands within your respective instances' notebook cells.

This guide describes how to migrate data and files by using Cloud Storage and the terminal.

Requirements

You must have terminal access to your user-managed notebooks instance. Terminal access is manually set when you create an instance. The terminal access setting cannot be changed after the instance is created.

Before you begin

Create a Cloud Storage bucket in the same project where your user-managed notebooks instance is located.

Migrate your data to a new user-managed notebooks instance

To migrate data and files to a new user-managed notebooks instance by using Cloud Storage and the terminal, complete the following steps.

  1. In your user-managed notebooks instance's JupyterLab interface, select File  > New  > Terminalto open a terminal window. Or connect to your instance's terminal by using SSH .

  2. Use the gcloud CLI to copy your user data to a Cloud Storage bucket. The following example command copies all of the files from your instance's /home/jupyter/ directory to a directory in a Cloud Storage bucket.

    gcloud storage cp /home/jupyter/* gs:// BUCKET_NAME 
 PATH 
--recursive

    Replace the following:

    • BUCKET_NAME : the name of your Cloud Storage bucket
    • PATH : the path to the directory where you want to copy your files, for example: /copy/jupyter/

  3. Create a user-managed notebooks instance .

  4. In your new user-managed notebooks instance's JupyterLab interface, select File  > New  > Terminalto open a terminal window.

  5. Use the gcloud CLI to restore your data on the new instance. The following example command copies all of the files from a Cloud Storage directory to the your new instance's /home/jupyter/ directory.

    gcloud storage cp gs:// BUCKET_NAME 
 PATH 
* /home/jupyter/

What's next