Computer lab for Physics 234/420/580

Physical access

Weekly labs will be held in CEB 324, which is equipped with 35 desktop PCs running GNU/Linux, an open-source version of the Unix operating system. Students may also use these computers for their assignments. Registered students can use their ONEcards to enter the lab around the clock for the duration of the term. Please see Terry Singleton in CEB 224B to have your card activated.

Remote access

Remote access is available through the gateway machine ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca. From there, you should log in to one of the lab computers directly (ugl101, ugl102,…,ugl135) to do your work. This requires two invocations of the ssh command (alternatives for Windows users), which is used to open a secure remote terminal. The gateway will accept logins from on campus and from Edmonton Shaw or Telus home networks. Files can be copied to and from your home directory via the scp command.

Windows people take note: Kyle has prepared an instruction sheet for PuTTY and Xming.

$ ssh -l p234u1xx -X ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca
p234u1xx@ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca's password: 
Last login: Tue Jan 10 13:14:53 2006 from authpf.phys.ualberta.ca

** NOTES **

- PBS web statistics at http://ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca/pbs/
- nodestatus command line utility now available.
- Intel compiler suite (f77/f90/C/C++) installed (ifc/icc)

[p234u1xx@ugl-gw ~]$ ssh -l p234u1xx -X ugl1yy
p234u1xx@ugl1yy's password:
[p234u1xx@ugl1yy ~]$ pwd
/clusterdisk/labhome/p234u1xx
[p234u1xx@ugl1yy ~]$ exit
logout
Connection to ugl1yy closed.
[p234u1xx@ugl-gw ~]$ exit
logout
Connection to ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca closed.
$ scp p234u1xx@ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca:myprog.cpp .
$ scp assignment1.tex p234u1xx@ugl-gw.phys.ualberta.ca:

Note that the -X option, which turns on X11 forwarding, is required for windowing applications. Feel free to leave it out if you intend to work from the terminal only. Also, be aware that scp will make a local copy if you don't include a colon (:) in the destination path.

C++ compilers for your own computer

There are many commercial C/C++ compilers available. There are also good alternatives that are completely free.

• If you have the Linux operating system on your machine, it's almost certain that you already have the GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) installed. Some of the Labs and Assignments also require OpenGL support, so you may want to check that you have the mesa, freeglut, and freeglut-development packages installed.
• If you are on a Mac, you're also in luck. The Macintosh operating system is based on Unix, and GCC is the default compiler. Open the program /Applications/Utilities/Terminal and type “g++” at the prompt. If you see something like

  $ g++
  i686-apple-darwin9-g++-4.0.1: no input files
  

  then the GNU C++ compiler is ready to go. If, however, you see

  $ g++
  -bash: g++: command not found
  

  then you'll have to install Apple's developer tools.
• If you are a Windows user, a good option is to download the 90-day free trial version of Microsoft Visual Studio. That should last almost the duration of the course. A more permanent solution would be to go with a freeware compiler, such as Dev-C++. Another possibility is to access the GNU Compiler Collection by running Linux on your machine, either using a live boot CD (very simple) or by configuring your machine to dual boot into Linux (very complicated). It's also possible to run GCC under Cygwin, which is an emulation layer that provides parts of the Linux API to Windows.