Setting up the Environment

Virtual Machine

We provide a virtual machine disk that is the base for the application that will be developed during this tutorial.

You can download the disk using this Link.

Using the Downloaded Disk

After downloading it, extract the .tar.gz file, create a new Virtual Machine at the virtualization client of your preference.

The instructions below are for Oracle VirtualBox . Oracle VirtualBox is available for Windows, OS X and Linux hosts.

This file is not a complete Virtual Machine dump that can be imported but instead a disk.

In order to use this disk, start by creating a new virtual Machine, select Type as Linux and Version as Ubuntu (64-bit). Configure the amount of memory to use (something greater or equal 2048MB should do it. Make sure to select Use an existing virtual hard disk file. and select the extracted .vmdk file.

Create new VM

Useful Virtual Machine Information

User Account

Username

Password

user

tutorial

Python Environment

On this machine we are using Miniconda to handle our Python environment and dependencies. To have access to the environmnet please do:

source activate tutorial

Simulated EPICS IOCs

This machine comes with simulated motors and cameras. The IOCs can be started through their launcher scripts available at:

cd ~/tutorial/iocs_launcher

# For the AreaDetector (cameras) simulation use
./simDetector

# For the simulated motor axis use
./simMotor

# For the linking IOC
./simLinker

For AreaDetector (cameras):

  • The prefix for the PVs is 13SIM1: so we have: 13SIM1:cam1 as well as 13SIM1:cam2 available.

For Motor Axis:

  • The prexif for the PVs is IOC: so we have: IOC:m1 .. IOC:m8

Creating your own environment

If you decide to create your own environment and not use the Virtual Machine provided please refer to the PyDM Documentation Website for an up-to-date dependency list as well as detailed installation instructions.