Set Up User Interface

Last update: 29 Jun 2023 [History] [Edit]

The user interface we will use will be ATLASLocalRootBase which is described here. This is a menu driven UI and it provides a number of commands that you can use. In the examples below, you will see the command setupATLAS. You will have to type this only once per session. Following this command, you will have the ability to set up a number of different tools.

In addition to being able to set up various tools, you have access to a few other useful commands:

  • printMenu: print the list of available setup commands again
  • helpMe: print a list of helpful resources for various tools and commands
  • showVersions: print a list of every available version of the available software. You generally only want to use this with the name of a software package as an argument such as showVersions root, otherwise you will be overloaded with a long list of every version of everything.

On lxplus

First determine the type of shell you are using (bash or zsh) by typing ps -p $$.

Edit ~/.bashrc (or ~/.zshrc for zsh) and add the lines

export RUCIO_ACCOUNT=<your lxplus username>

Simply type setupATLAS afterwords.

You do not need to define anything else.

Troubleshooting on lxplus

Normally, setupATLAS should be automatically defined for you on lxplus. In the rare case that it does not work out of the box, it could be due to you not being part of the zp group. You can check whether you are by using the command:

id -a

If you do not see (zp) in the output, you should request access now. Follow this link and subscribe to zp: Linux group zp - ATLAS.

On Tier3 Machines

If your site admin has not defined it, or if it is unavailable for some reason, you can define these in your login scripts.

First determine the type of shell you are using (bash or zsh) by typing ps -p $$.

Edit ~/.bashrc (or ~/.zshrc for zsh) and add the lines

export ATLAS_LOCAL_ROOT_BASE=/cvmfs/atlas.cern.ch/repo/ATLASLocalRootBase
alias setupATLAS='source ${ATLAS_LOCAL_ROOT_BASE}/user/atlasLocalSetup.sh'
export RUCIO_ACCOUNT=<your lxplus username>

Next, open a new terminal session and type setupATLAS.

tip It is good practice to never log out of your current shell after making changes to .bashrc (or the equivalent for whichever shell you are using) until you have tested it by opening a new shell. This is to prevent the situation in which you introduce a bug in you .bashrc that prevents you from editing it again (or worse) in a new shell session. Keeping the original shell open will allow you to revert any problematic changes.

For more details, see these instructions.

Using Containers

If your Tier3 machine does not have a particular operating system installed, such as CentOS7, you can set it up using a container. To do this using CentOS7, use the command:

setupATLAS -c centos7

You can also do this on your personal computer following the instructions available on this twiki.

Set up ROOT

Now that you have the interface set up, you can set up software packages such as ROOT. To do this, you will use the lsetup command. In the case of ROOT, it is necessary to specify which version you wish to use. You can do this using e.g.:

lsetup "root 6.28.00-x86_64-centos7-gcc11-opt"

Alternatively, you can set up the recommended version using:

lsetup "root recommended"