Environment Modules

The Environment Modules software is used to manage the user’s environment, dynamically modifying the user’s environment to allow the execution of various software packages. Both the Cray software and the ASKAP specific software uses this approach. Typically, modules will alter the user’s PATH and/or LD_LIBRARY_PATH, and other environment variables that may be necessary to execute some software package.

You can browse all software packages that can be loaded using this mechanism with the following command:

module avail

In order for the ASKAP specific modules to appear in this list you must have already executed the following command. However this command should have been added to your .bashrc file per the instructions in the section Central Processor Platform:

module use /group/askap/modulefiles

The ASKAP modules appear in their own section in the output from the module avail command:

------------------------------------------------------------------ /group/askap/modulefiles -----------------------------------------
aces/0.3(default)                askapsoft/0.4.0                  askapsoft/0.7.2                  bbcp/13.05.03.00.0(default)
ashell                           askapsoft/0.4.1                  askapsoft/0.7.3                  casa/30.1.11097-001-64b
askapdata/current(default)       askapsoft/0.5.0                  askapsoft/0.8.0                  casa/4.3.0-el5
askappipeline/r7046              askapsoft/0.6.1                  askapsoft/0.8.1                  casa/41.0.24668-001(default)
askappipeline/r7054              askapsoft/0.6.2                  askapsoft/0.9.0                  casa/42.2.30986-1-64b
askappipeline/r7064              askapsoft/0.6.3                  askapsoft/0.9.1(default)         deprecated-python/2.7.6(default)
askappipeline/r7067(default)     askapsoft/0.7.0                  askapsoft/r6822                  tmux/1.8(default)

These modules are:

• askapsoft - The ASKAPsoft Central Processor applications binaries and libraries
• askapdata - Measures data for ASKAPsoft
• askappipeline - Pipeline scripts for processing ASKAP/BETA observations
• casa - NRAO’s CASA software package (see Using CASA)
• bbcp - BBCP Fast file copy (see External Data Transfer)
• ashell - Connection to the commissioning archive (see Commissioning Archive Platform)
• aces - Libraries used for the ACES tools (see ACES wiki page)

You can use the module whatis command to obtain a description of the module:

$ module whatis askapdata
askapdata            : Measures data for ASKAPsoft

You can use the module list command to view already loaded modules, and you will note many Cray modules already loaded. A given module can be loaded like so:

module load askapsoft

And can be unloaded just as simply:

module unload askapsoft

Notice the askapsoft module has multiple versions, with the version number indicated, for instance askapsoft/0.8.0. You will also see one is tagged “(default)””. If you execute the “module load askapsoft” command you will load the default version. You can load a specific version by specifying the version in the module load command:

module load askapsoft/0.9.0

Often it is useful to understand exactly how a module will modify your environment. The module display command can be used to determine this. For instance:

$ module display askapsoft
-------------------------------------------------------------------
/group/askap/modulefiles/askapsoft/0.9.1:

module-whatis    ASKAPsoft software package
prepend-path     PATH /group/askap/askapsoft/0.9.1/bin
prepend-path     LD_LIBRARY_PATH /group/askap/askapsoft/0.9.1/lib64
-------------------------------------------------------------------

The above shows that the askapsoft module will prepend the ASKAPsoft bin directory to you PATH environment variable, and the lib64 directory to your LD_LIBRARY_PATH. Likewise the askapdata module can be inspected:

$ module display askapdata
-------------------------------------------------------------------
/group/askap/modulefiles/askapdata/current:

module-whatis   Measures data for ASKAPsoft
setenv          AIPSPATH /group/askap/askapdata/current
-------------------------------------------------------------------

This shows that the AIPSPATH will be set to point to the directory containing measures data.