Local Access

If you are a member of the Structural Biology group at Purdue, and would like to have access to these programs, it is not necessary to download the programs. These programs are installed on a cluster of IBM RS/6000 workstations. You should obtain an account on the cluster, configure your account to point to the XTAL programs and run your crystallography data through the programs.

Hardware Setup

The IBM RS/6000 cluster consists of the workstations named dart, dash, deft and deep. These machines are maintained by the Purdue University Computing Center (PUCC). However, new account application for people in Structural Biology should be directed to Dwight D. McKay who is the Computer Systems Specialist in the Department of Biological Sciences. Once you have been given an account on the cluster, you can login to any of the 4d workstations such as dart.cc. The following directories are accessible on the cluster :

Software Setup

After obtaining an account on the IBM RS/6000 cluster, you should add the following line to your .cshrc file to establish some environment variables :

• source /usr/site/xtal/.cshrc

You should also add this line to your .login file :

• source /usr/site/xtal/.login

/usr/site/xtal/.login sets up your path so that you can easily access the XTAL executables in /usr/site/xtal/bin and /usr/site/xtal/bink. It also sets up the MANPATH environment variable so that you can access the manual pages stored under /usr/site/xtal/Xman. For example, you can read the manual on the mgrosc program by issuing the command :

• man mgrosc

If your MANPATH environment variable is not set up properly, you can access the mgrosc manual page by issuing :

• man -M /usr/site/xtal/Xman mgrosc

Back