20020820: v2002 Upgrade questions

>From: William C Klein <address@hidden>
>Organization: Valparaiso
>Keywords: 200208202025.g7KKPeK00412 McIDAS-X v2002 upgrade

Bill,

>How long will the upgrade from McIDAS 7.8 to 2000 take?

It depends on how fast one's machine is.  The download and build on a
reasonably fast machine should take less than one hour.  The tests
of the new distribution should take on the order of 10 minutes.  The
installation of the new distribution shoudl take an additional 10-15
minutes.  Finally, checking out the various componets after the installation
can take anywhere from 10 minutes to an hour or more depending on
if things went smoothly.

>Any hitches involved?

Not that I know of given that you have not customized your current
installation.  Users that really know McIDAS can do a lot of customizations,
and that will require more careful consideration of changes that are
contained in the new distribution.

As far as things to look out for:

1) you MUST replace the version of xcd_run that you are using in your
   LDM configuration files ldmd.conf and pqact.conf with the version
   that gets installed in the ~mcidas/bin directory.  This version contains
   a bug fix that is important.  Recall that when you make this change
   you will need to edit the new version of xcd_run and set environment
   variables to match your setup.  This is most easily done by not simply
   overwriting your old copy, but, instead, backing it up and then
   merging mods you made to it with the new version that will then be
   used to start XCD decoders, etc.

2) after you build and test the new McIDAS version, you should shut down
   your LDM while you do the installation of the new modules

3) Depending on exactly what version of McIDAS you are upgrading from
   (e.g., 7.800 vs 7.801, or 7.802,  etc.) it will be mandatory to
   deleted the file ~mcidas/workdata/DECINFO.DAT.  This file will
   need to be recreated after the installation of the v2002 binaries
   by doing the following (all as the user 'mcidas'):

<login as 'mcidas'>
cd ~mcidas/workdata
decinfo.k LIST

   At this point, you may or may not need to do one additional step
   depending on whether or not you were decoding grib messages with
   XCD.  If you were, you will need to do:

cd ~mcidas/workdata
decinfo.k SET DMGRID ACTIVE

   If you were not, you do not need to perform this step

4) you turn the LDM back on AFTER you finish the McIDAS installation and
   mods in step 3).

Please let me know if you run into any problems.

Tom