Software setup

Overview

Teaching: 10 min
Exercises: 10 min

Questions

• What software do I need?

Objectives

• Get all the necessary software installed before beginning the lessons

File download (DO BEFORE ARRIVING)

For the workshop you will need to download a large (~10 GB) .ova file which contains the virtual machine (VM) that we will be using. Because of it’s large size it’s important to download it before the workshop.

To download it use:

curl -O  "ftp://elwood.ru.ac.za/pub/geyer/NWU_pulsartiming/virtual_box/pulsarVM.ova"

or if you don’t have curl installed you can use wget:

wget ftp://elwood.ru.ac.za/pub/geyer/NWU_pulsartiming/virtual_box/pulsarVM.ova

Assumed knowledge

This course assumes that you have basic proficiency with the command line / bash terminal, a text editor and simple Python scripting. If you are unfamiliar with any of these concepts, we recommend the following tutorials:

• (linux) command line / bash SWC Lesson, ADACS Lesson
• command line text editor (emacs/vim/nano)
• Python scripting SWC Lesson, ADACS Lesson
• Statistics SARAO lesson

Installing VirtualBox

To make the software installation easier we are going to use a virtual machine (VM) that has all the required software preinstalled. We will run the VM using VirtualBox which is a tool for managing and running VMs. To install, follow the instructions in here which contains detailed instructions. The following sections will will summarize how to install on common systems. If you have an issue refer to the full instructions on the website or email Nick (nswainston@swin.edu.au)

Windows

Download the .exe file from this link and follow the setup instructions.

Linux (Ubuntu 22.04)

How to install is OS dependent so there are more details instructions here. Here is an example of how to install it for Ubuntu 22.04 by downloading the .deb and installing it with apt:

wget https://download.virtualbox.org/virtualbox/7.0.10/virtualbox-7.0_7.0.10-158379~Ubuntu~jammy_amd64.deb
sudo apt install ./virtualbox-7.0_7.0.10-158379~Ubuntu~jammy_amd64.deb

Using Virtual Box

Once you have VirtualBox installed you can open it to open the .ova file that you downloaded earlier:

• Click File (top left) then Import Appliance...
• Click the folder icon and navigate to the .ova file you downloaded earlier
• All the default setting are fine so just click yes until it starts Importing appliance ...
• Once it’s done you should see a pulsarVM VM in the left hand side of the VirtualBox window, click on it and then click Start (top right)
• The VM will start up, click Debian GNU/Linux or wait a few seconds then you should VM window and the terminal

VirtualBox tips and FAQ

VirtualBox can be a bit confusing at first so here are a few tips:

• If you VM fails to start, check the logs (Ctrl + L) for clues why. If you see an error like HM: HMR3Init: Attempting fall back to NEM: VT-x is disabled in the BIOS for all CPU modes you have to change your BIOS settings to enable virtualization technology (e.g. for ASUS motherboard)
• You can use Right Ctrl to use VirtualBox shortcuts
• To make use of your full screen resolution open View (top left), then Virtual Screen 1 and click Scale to 100%. Then once you change the window to full screen it should use your full screen resolution

Key Points

• How to install software