Obtaining AIPS++

Version 1.9 Build 874

Obtaining AIPS++

Note: The AIPS++ binary installations povide a minimal subset of the AIPS++ data repository. This version is not appropriate for development. Support for users not affiliated with the ALMA project may be delayed or deferred.

Download:

To download, point your browser to or ftp directly from ftp://ftp.cv.nrao.edu/casa/end-user/application/. Here you will find directories containing RPM (RedHat Package Manager) files for each of the supported OSs --

OS Build Support These directories include pointers to minimal set of RPMs required to run AIPS++ for each OS as an end-user and developer RPMs required for application development within the package.

The full set of OS specific application and OS independent data repository RPMs are also available via FTP.

Should you wish to update your installation, new RPMs will be built following each stable release. They can be downloaded from the location listed above.

For Solaris users, existing AIPS++ installations can be brought up to date using the 'aupdate' command.

Install:

These rpms are re-locatable and do not require root permission to install. To install the AIPS++ data reduction package, execute the following commands from the UNIX command line (Red Hat 9 example):

#Move to directory; copy rpm database
cd install_directory #replace install directory with full path name 
set mypwd=`pwd`      #set variable to working directory to simplify later commands 
(cd /var/lib; tar cf - rpm) | tar xf -

#install support libraries
rpm -iv --force --dbpath $mypwd/rpm \
    --prefix $mypwd \
    gccshare+3.3-11-4ds.i386.rpm \
    gppshare+3.3-11-4ds.i386.rpm \
    g77share+3.3-11-4ds.i386.rpm \
    pgplot-5.2.2-4ds.i386.rpm \
    pgplot-motif-5.2.2-4ds.i386.rpm \
    rpfits-2.6-13ds.i386.rpm \
    cfitsio-2.401-12ds.i386.rpm 

# 
# install AIPS++ data repository
echo "Required AIPS++ data (e.g., IERS data, source catalogs, observatory locations)..."
rpm -iv --force --dbpath $mypwd/rpm \
    --prefix $mypwd \
    casa-data-20041013-1ds.noarch.rpm \
    casa-data-base-20041013-1ds.noarch.rpm 
#
# install AIPS++ rpms
echo "CASA (AIPS++) libraries..."
rpm -iv --force --dbpath $mypwd/rpm \
    --prefix $mypwd \
    casa-19.819-7ds.i386.rpm \
    casa-shared-19.819-7ds.i386.rpm \
    glish-2.8.0-5ds.i386.rpm
#

 Note: you may get the error:

error: db4 error(13) from db->close: Permission denied

This is an artefact of the re-locatable rpm permissions and can be ignored. Once this successfully completes, then ensure that the aips++ binary has been added to your path and you will likely want to add the following lines to your .bashrc/(t)cshrc file:

echo $PATH                    
add to files: 
  #.bashrc
  set casapath=install_directory
  export PATH=$casapath/bin:$PATH    
  #.(t)cshrc
  set casapath=install_directory
  set path=($casapath/bin $path)

Note: If you have a prior installation of AIPS++, some RPMs may fail to install. This will be indicated by a message like:

file "FILENAME" from install of "RPMNAME" conflicts with file from package "RPMNAME"

Should this happen, reinstall these RPMs with "rpm -Uvh" rather than "rpm -ivh".

Running AIPS++:

To use AIPS++, your machine needs to have at least 512 MB of memory (RAM) with at least 1 GB of swap space, though more is better. The disk space required varies depending upon the dataset. Having 5 GB should be safe in all cases.

AIPS++ can be started simply by typing "aips++" at the UNIX command prompt.