For students who wish to use the data reduction software on the own computer (at home), we offer a preconfigured virtual machine running Ubuntu 12.10. To implement own software, use apt-get.

The virtual machine has these programs installed:

• ds9
• midas
• gdl mit astron
• wine
• Fitswork
• Kate, vim
• wrplot, gnuplot, pgplot
• nightfall 2 3
• ssh bookmarks for the physical laboratory course computers in Nautilus and Dolphin

Current version of the virtual box: November 30, 2013.

Bring a USB stick with sufficient size (current size of the box ~ 3 GB) and ask the instructors. Alternatively, download the machine here (Authorized access only).

The program can be downloaded here.

See here.

For support of USB2 and scaling-free window sizing additionally install the VirtualBox Extension Pack from the same page. This should be installed before the virtual machine is imported. Then reboot the (virtual) computer.

• import Appliance
• Click Select and find the location of the virtual machine, then import

The virtual machine has/is:

• built with Oracle VM VirtualBox 4.3.4
• 32bit
• 1024 MB RAM (can and should be increased)
• 1 CPU (can and should be increased)
• PAE/NX needs to be activated
• Hardware-Virtualisation and 3D acceleration disabled (can and should be active)
• 64 MB Graphics RAM (can and should be increased)
• Network-NAT (to use the internet connection of the host system)
• bidirecional clipboard (host and guest system have a common clipboard, this requires the “Guest” extension)

With changes, the VirtualBox Extension Pack might need to be installed again.

Download (and install) the software applicable for your system Von der folgenden Seite die für das eigene System passende Software herunterladen und installieren: 64 bit systems (version 7) or 32/64 bit systems (version 6)

Disclaimer VMware Player: VMware Player is free for private use. VMware Player Plus is liscensed for commercial use. If you want to learn the handling of virtual machines or try them out at home, you may use the free version VMware Player, too!

Sometimes Ubuntu fails to boot and freezes at the Ubuntu-logo. The reason could be that gnome or the X-server is broken (if the machine is booted with startx, there will be errormessages like /etc/X11/xinit/xserverrc: 3: exec: …). Follow these steps to solve the issue (Note: you need to be online):

1. Change to the Recovery Mode during the booting process (press the Shift or ESC button)
2. Resume booting
3. Ubuntu boots without the desktop (just a shell)
4. login with normal user, password
5. execute: sudo apt-get update (the sudo password is the normal praktikum password)
6. execute: sudo apt-get install ubuntu-desktop

Either start the desktop with startx. It is however highly recommend to reboot the machine with sudo reboot. The machine will then start with desktop.

First check if the system is using the latest version.

sudo apt-get update                        # update the package sources
sudo apt-get dist-upgrade                  # update the packages

It's important to have the package “update-manager-core” installed. Then prepare the update for the system:

sudo update-manager --proposed

The update will start after clicking “Update/Aktualisieren” and a window with the sharing notice /* Freigabemitteilung /* needs to be confirmed “Update system/System aktualisieren”. The info-window “The support for some programs has ceased/Die Unterstützung für einige Anwendungen wurde eingestellt” can be closed. A final confirmation window “Do you want to start the system update/Möchten Sie die Systemaktualisierung starten?” needs to be approved “Start system update/Systemaktualisierung beginnen”. During the update presend package souces from the file sources.list are automatically obtained. Nearly all packages are being updated, thus the download will take time (for more than 1000 packages). Otherwise the update of the distribution follows its regular cause.