INSTALL.txt

== Installation Notes for the BatStack project ==

Scott Livingston  <slivingston@caltech.edu>

(See README.txt for copyright and license information.)


This INSTALL file will be filled in eventually, likely after the
complete reference manual for the Project is written.  I am working on
this actively but cannot yet commit to a delivery date.  For now,
unsorted installation notes are collected below.  These are due to me
hacking around with the system or from suggestions from others.

Many components of the system --primarily those that are
host-computer-related-- are written in Python and depend on the
batstack module, which is located under src/util.  In most cases, you
will need to add this directory to the search path of your Python
installation.  The easiest solution (which I prefer, for now), is to
add the full path to src/util to the variable PYTHONPATH in your shell
environment.  For example, if you had placed the BatStack source under

/home/frodo/research/Batlab/BatStack

Then to append to PYTHONPATH in your current shell session,

$ export PYTHONPATH=$PYTHONPATH:/home/frodo/research/Batlab/BatStack/src/util

For this to occur for every session (or if you are working in a
GUI/desktop environment), then you need to add the above line (or one
like it) to your shell startup script, or system variables, etc.
E.g., if you use zsh, add the above line to .zshrc in your home
directory, i.e.

$ echo 'export PYTHONPATH=$PYTHONPATH:/home/frodo/research/Batlab/BatStack/src/util' >> ~/.zshrc

Test whether you successfully added src/util to your Python search
path by trying to access the batstack module documentation, which you
should read anyway,

$ pydoc batstack