Module 0: Checking your software installation

Overview

Aims and objectives

Check that your software has been correctly installed on your laptop Learn the basic usage instructions for the software

Who to find if you get stuck during the student week

George Hobbs, Mike Keith, Maura McLaughlin, Ryan Shannon, Nathaniel Garver-Daniels, Lawrence Toomey

1. Does the internet work?

Load a web browser and test that the internet connection is working by searching for the papers on astro-ph. (http://arxiv.org/archive/astro-ph).

Note: if you are using a pre-installed computer you may need to find a web-browser by clicking on "Applications"

For these worksheets you will be using tempo2, presto and psrchive. Download the recent tutorials on these topics from arXiv:1206.0588, arXiv:1205.6273 and arXiv:1205.6276.

Can you access the internet?

Are all members of your group experienced with using a unix-based system? If not, find an online tutorial that demonstrates the basic functionality. (We recommend http://www.ee.surrey.ac.uk/Teaching/Unix/).

Add your name and a description of your work in the relevant forum on this website.

(Don't panic if the internet is not working. All the required data files have been installed on the computers.)

2. Does tempo2 work?

Obtain an x-terminal or a terminal and type in:

 > tempo2 -h

The output should provide some basic usage instructions and list all the available plugins. How many plugins are available on your computer? It is essential that the TEMPO2 environment variable is set. You can view this by typing:

> echo $TEMPO2

3. Does psrchive and PGPLOT work?

You should have some pre-loaded data in a directory called “data”. Run the following commands:

> cd ~/data/module1/1713_pulsar_data_archive/
> pav -CD *.FTp

You should see lots of observations of PSR J1713+0747. These observations will be used in module 1. Now we'll test whether we can obtain pulse arrival times (this will be explained in detail in module 1):

> pat -s t090211_215434.FTp -f tempo2 *.FTp

This should list out five columns of information. The last column gives the observatory site code which should be "7" for data from the Parkes telescope. (Note: an incorrect installation may give a "0" in this column. Please confirm that your installation is correct.)

4. Does presto work?

Presto is used when searching for pulsars. It requires the PRESTO environment variable that can be checked using:

> echo $PRESTO

Some search mode file exists in your data directory:

> cd ~/data/module2

The data files are in PSRFITS format. Type in the following to obtain a list of command-line arguments for the readfile software:

 > readfile

What was the sample time used for 1857.sf?

Download the pdf for this module Module0.pdf