20010323: Unidata application installation at Valparaiso (cont.)

>From: Simon Kissler <address@hidden>
>Organization: Valparaiso
>Keywords: 200103231414.f2NEEhL25449 McIDAS-X ADDE

Simon,

In an earlier not to Anne Wilson, you commented:

>I don't know if this got all the way to you but the way this is planned
>for setup is that we have one machine (server) ingest the data and
>multiple lab type machines use the data. From the information on the site
>it would seem that ADDE would be the best choice for this, however, I
>can't seem to figure out how to set up the clients to do this. I have
>mcidas-x installed and working on the clients, however, my attempts at
>setting up the data routing appear to fail miserably. :)

I will be assisting you in getting the McIDAS setup working.

>Any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

Here goes.  In order to share data via ADDE, you first have to install
the ADDE remote server on the machine from which you will want to serve
data.  Installation of the McIDAS remote ADDE server is described in
detail in the Unidata McIDAS-X web pages, so you can use them for
reference.

In this and the next couple of emails, I will attempt to lay out the
most expedient path to getting ADDE setup on both the server and client
sides.

Server issues:

<as 'root'>

o if you havn't already done so, create an account named 'mcadde'
o the HOME directory for 'mcadde' should be the same as the HOME directory
  for the user 'mcidas'
o the default login shell for 'mcadde' should /bin/false: The 'mcadde'
  account should NOT have login privilege

If your machine is not running NIS/NIS+, the installation of the remote
ADDE server is very easy and is described in:

Installing the McIDAS-X ADDE Remote Server 
http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/mcidas/770/mcx/adde_mcx.html

<still as 'root'>

cd ~mcidas
sh ./mcinet7.7.sh install mcadde

During the McIDAS installation process, you were instructed to create
the file '.mcenv' in the HOME directory of the user 'mcidas'.  The
contents of this file are described in:

                  Unidata McIDAS-X
mcidas, mcadde Account Preparation

http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/mcidas/770/mcx/mcxacct.html 

If the "sh ./mcinet7.7.sh install mcadde" succeeded, and if you are not
running NIS/NIS+, then your system is setup to be able to provide
remote ADDE services.

The next step on the server side is configuring the 'mcidas' account to
specify which datasets the remote ADDE server will provide.  This
should have already been done during the configuring McIDAS-X after
installation, and is described in:

Configuring Unidata McIDAS-X Accounts
http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/mcidas/770/mcx/config_mcx.html 
  Configuring the mcidas Account
  http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/packages/mcidas/770/mcx/config_mcidas.html

The jist of this section as far as setting up datasets that the remote
ADDE server can access is:

<login as the user 'mcidas'>

cd data
cp EXAMPLE.NAM LOCAL.NAM
cp DSSERVE.BAT LSSERVE.BAT
cp DATALOC.BAT LOCDATA.BAT

1) edit LOCAL.NAM and replace the directory references to match where
   you want to have McIDAS-XCD decoders write data files

2) edit LSSERVE.BAT and make any adjustments; for a new McIDAS user, you
   should leave this file alone

3) edit LOCDATA.BAT and replace 'fully_qualified_host_identifier' with then
   name of the ADDE server that will be accessed for the various datasets.

   If the name of your machine is aeolus.valpo.edu, then the contents of
   LOCDATA.BAT will look like:

DATALOC ADD CIMSS     aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD GINICOMP  papagayo.unl.edu
DATALOC ADD GINIEAST  papagayo.unl.edu
DATALOC ADD GINIWEST  papagayo.unl.edu
DATALOC ADD RTGINI    papagayo.unl.edu
DATALOC ADD RTGRIDS   aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTIMAGES  aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTNIDS    aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTNEXRAD  aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTNOWRAD  aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTPTSRC   aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD RTWXTEXT  aeolus.valpo.edu
DATALOC ADD TOPO      aeolus.valpo.edu

NOTES:

1) if your site has a NOAAPORT ingest system, and you are getting channels
   1 or 2, then you are ingesting the NOAAPORT GINI imagery locally.
   In this case, the machine to access for the GINI data would be
   aeolus.valpo.edu, not papagayo.unl.edu.

2) ADDE access to GINI imagery can be done from several cooperating
   sites on the net:

   adde.ucar.edu           - all GINI data
   papagayo.unl.edu        - all GINI data
   snow.plymouth.edu       - all GINI data
   cacimbo.ggy.uga.edu     - GINIEAST and GINICOMP GINI data only

   As a first shot, you will fix the machine you get the GINI data from.
   Later, as you and your users become more adept, you may vary who you
   get the data from.  This could change depending on network congestion
   and server loading factors.

3) if each machine running McIDAS is to have McIDAS installed on it,
   then the TOPO entry would be better if it was:

DATALOC ADD TOPO      LOCAL-DATA

   In this case, the imagery in the TOPO dataset will be accessed from the
   local disk.

<still as the user 'mcidas'>

cd ~/workdata
<start a McIDAS-X session>

run the following from the McIDAS Text and Command window

TE XCDDATA "directory_where_XCD_will_put_decoded_files

'directory_where_XCD_will_put_decoded_files' will match the directory you
set in 1) edit LOCAL.NAM

REDIRECT REST LOCAL.NAM
BATCH LSSERVE.BAT
BATCH LOCDATA.BAT

Now, the remote server is configured to be able to serve the various datasets
defined in LOCDATA.BAT.

The next step is to configure McIDAS-XCD and ldm-mcidas to decode data
ingested with the LDM.  Before I proceed with these steps, let's touch
base to make sure that the above steps have been performed with no errors.

After we get the server machine ingesting and decoding data, we will exercise
the remote ADDE server installation to make sure that there are no problems.
The last step will be to configure your client machines to request data
through the remote ADDE server.

Tom Yoksas