Differences

This shows you the differences between two versions of the page.

--- computing:department:unix:software:idl [2013/09/18 17:09] – nick
+++ computing:department:unix:software:idl [2015/11/25 10:50] (current) – allan
@@ Line 2: / Line 2: @@
 IDL is supported on the linux cluster primarily for specific research groups in Astronomy and Cosmology. A few licenses are also provided by Physics and Astronomy for general use.
+To use IDL, you first need to load the software module:
+  module load idl
+After that, for a command line interface, type
+  idl
+or for IDL's development environment, type
+  idlde
+For interactive help, type
+  idlhelp
 ===== The IDL Astronomy User's Library =====
+<note>possibly outdated info?</note>
 The IDL Astronomy Users Library is a central repository for low-level astronomy software written in the commercial language IDL. More info at http://idlastro.gsfc.nasa.gov/.
@@ Line 9: / Line 23: @@
 In order to use the network copy of this software, you must modify the IDL_PATH environment path.
-==== CSH ====
+For csh:
   setenv IDL_PATH "<IDL_DEFAULT>:/local/astro/idl_astro/pro"
-==== Bash ====
+for bash:
   export IDL_PATH="<IDL_DEFAULT>:/local/astro/idl_astro/pro"
-===== Multiple copies of IDL on the same machine =====
+===== Running multiple copies of IDL on the same machine =====
-From Princeton Astronomy department: IDL hands out licenses based on hostname+username+display. If all three of those are equal you can start as many sessions as you want and only consume one license. The modern habit of letting ssh create X tunnels causes the display name to be different for each ssh connection, even if several connections come from a single host. There are several ways of making your DISPLAY name the same for all such connections. The simplest is to note which your first one is (echo $DISPLAY), and set DISPLAY on other connections to that. Or for a console-only IDL session, simply unset DISPLAY completely.
+This hint was taken from Princeton Astronomy department: IDL hands out licenses based on hostname+username+display. If all three of those are equal, you can start as many sessions as you want and only consume one license. The modern habit of letting ssh create X tunnels causes the display name to be different for each ssh connection, even if several connections come from a single host. There are several ways of making your DISPLAY name the same for all such connections. The simplest is to note which your first one is (echo $DISPLAY), and set DISPLAY on other connections to that. Or for a console-only IDL session, simply unset DISPLAY completely.
 ===== Running IDL jobs without license restrictions =====
@@ Line 29: / Line 41: @@
 ===== Problems and workarounds =====
-==== Online help in IDL 7.0 ====
+none at present
-IDL 7 online help may not work properly without taking special steps. Their release notes have this to say about the fix to their help system:
-<code>
-  If you use the IDL Workbench, simply starting the Workbench
-  with the
-    idlde
-  command causes IDL to use the newly-installed version of
-  XULRunner. If you use IDL in command-line mode (without starting
-  the IDL Workbench), you must start the IDL help server before
-  starting IDL in order for the ? command to work properly.
-  To do this, enter the following commands at the shell prompt:
-    idlhelp
-    idl
-  Note that the IDL help server continues to run after you have
-  ended your IDL session. If you prefer to shut down the IDL help
-  server, enter the following command at the shell prompt:
-    idlhelp -command shutdown
-  Depending on your system, it may take several moments for the
-  help server to start. Leaving the help server running speeds up
-  the response time of the ? command significantly.
-</code>

User Tools

Differences

Page Tools