Remote webpage access

Posted on March 12, 2015 by Adam Thorn

There are many websites that are only accessible from either a University or a Department IP address – for example, many journal websites, internal Departmental pages (such as those with .private. in the address). One method for accessing such pages is to use our OpenVPN service. However, you might not always want to use the OpenVPN service: perhaps you are using a public computer, or perhaps you only want to quickly look at one paper and don’t wish to connect to the VPN.
Therefore, we’ve recently launched a new service. You can use it by going to https://proxy.ch.cam.ac.uk, and entering a website address into the box on the page. A server in the Department will then access the page on your behalf, and show you the webpage contents. If there are pages you access regularly, you can load them through the proxy server and then bookmark them in your web browser for later access. You can also create a bookmark by following the instructions on our website, which will let you reload any webpage you are currently viewing through our proxy server.

Posted in Remote access | Comments Off on Remote webpage access

ChemBioDraw 14

Posted on January 12, 2015 by Russell Currie

ChemBioDraw Ultra 14 is now available to members of the University. Instructions for downloading, installing and activating the software can be found on our site. If you use one of one of the managed windows workstations, you should be able to obtain the latest version of ChemDraw through WPKG.

Posted in Software | Comments Off on ChemBioDraw 14

MATLAB2014b and locale on Ubuntu

Posted on October 22, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

This week we were trying to make the new MATLAB R2014b package available on the managed Linux workstations. The new version persistently produced an error message about locales when run on my test machine. However it worked fine on another supposedly identical machine.
When we checked the locale settings on the test machine they were incorrect, which was unsurprising. However the confusing thing was how they had got that way. The usual config files on the test machine all had correct locale settings. We also found that manually correcting the locale on the problem machine setting the LC_ALL and LANG environment variables didn’t make the MATLAB error vanish, which was very surprising.
Eventually we discovered that the problem was a .pam_environment file in my home directory with some outdated locale settings in it. This file is read as part of the process of starting a new session on our managed workstations, and its contents affect the environment. Loading MATLAB appears to cause that file to be reread, overwriting any locale settings we had previously set.
So now we have a working MATLAB R2014b package (load the appropriate module to use it if you’re on a managed Linux workstation). And if you try it and get an error message about locale, check your home directory for .pam_environment .

Posted in Software, technical | Comments Off on MATLAB2014b and locale on Ubuntu

Chemical waste

Posted on October 15, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

Recently the batteries failed abruptly in one of our UPSes. When we came to replace them it was very obvious why. Here’s the battery pack immediately after removing from the UPS. The batteries are meant to be flat on top but these have bulged out so much that it took a lot of effort to get them out of the unit.
IMG_0717
And here’s one of the batteries after removing from the pack. This one is not just bulging, it has actually split open.
IMG_0720
They have now been safely disposed of in the chemical waste store and the UPS is working again.

Posted in Hardware | Comments Off on Chemical waste

Keep your systems up to date!

Posted on October 10, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

A timely warning from the University Information Service:

Various high profile data security exploits have made the news recently. Please apply all available software updates and patches (for the operating system and all installed apps) to your devices: desktop computers, laptops, tablets and other mobile devices can all be vulnerable and should all be updated regularly to help protect you against attacks. Please also update any isolated computers that have been running for some time (e.g. running a service or busy doing a data analysis); these may not be regularly reviewed and, as a consequence are usually very vulnerable.
Further advice on how to Stay Safe Online is available.

Within Chemistry we offer some things that can help with this. Managed workstations are automatically kept up to date by the IT staff.
You can see your machine’s last security scan results in our system monitor. Look for the ‘probes’ report.
Old equipment that is running operating systems such as Windows XP where there is no longer any security support can be automatically placed on a restricted network segment. Here it can get any security updates that are available, and can exchange data with local fileservers, but is otherwise protected from access from the network.
The University Information Service offers free anti-virus software for all members of the University.

Posted in security, Software | Comments Off on Keep your systems up to date!

Knime 2.10 available

Posted on September 19, 2014 by Adam Thorn

We now have a package for Knime 2.10.1 available for installation on managed Windows workstations. It is distributed through our normal software distribution system, and users can request installation via the software management web interface.

Posted in Software | Comments Off on Knime 2.10 available

New Portland compilers

Posted on September 12, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

Version 14.9 of the Portland Group compiler suite is now rolling out on managed Linux workstations running Ubuntu 14.04 and managed clusters.
If you are running the older managed Linux image based on Ubuntu 12.04 and want access to the latest compilers we will be happy to upgrade your machine to 14.04. Just send an email to support@ch.cam.ac.uk .

Posted in Software | Comments Off on New Portland compilers

New Intel compilers and version number confusion

Posted on September 10, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

This week we’ve installed two new versions of the Intel Compiler suite on the Linux workstations and clusters. Because all compilers and codes have their quirks, we try to keep several different versions of each compiler available at all times. We use the modules system to do this. The idea is that one can look at the available modules on any machine and pick the appropriate version of the compiler to load.
Sounds straightforward? Not entirely. It’s not always clear how to name the modules. Intel compilers are sold with a name such as ‘2013 SP1 release 4’. But that particular product has an internal version number of 14.0.4, whereas the product sold as ‘2013 release 5’ is internally version 13.1.3 and the product called ‘2011 SP1’ is internally version 12.1. To complicate matters, these compilers are bundled with the Intel Math Kernel library which has its own entirely different version numbering system.
So which number do we use in the module name? We’ve decided to go for the product name rather than the version for the compilers, as that’s what Intel obviously prefer their customers to see. For MKL we use the separate MKL version number rather than the compiler bundle number. Which means that this week we installed the following modules:

Module name Internal version
icc/64/2015/0/191 15.0.0
icc/64/2013_sp1/4/211 14.0.4
mkl/64/11.1/lp64/4 11.1.4
mkl/64/11.2/lp64/0 11.2

If you’re using one of our managed Linux machines or compute clusters, you should find these versions are now available. The 2015 modules are a new major version, so expect a few changes. They support extra OpenMP directives, C++11, the whole of Fortran 2003, and many Fortran 2008 features.

Posted in Clusters, Linux, Software | Comments Off on New Intel compilers and version number confusion

Server room update

Posted on August 26, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

Some of you may have been following the saga of our server room refurbishment. The main part of the refurbishment has been done for a while and we even took pictures of the process, but we haven’t posted them until now.
So here’s what it looked like while we were putting the new networking in. We installed patch panels in each server rack so we only have to run a short network lead from each server to the nearest network socket. Originally we used to have network cables running around the room on a ceiling tray and back to a single large patch panel. It was difficult to tell what was plugged in where. The new system is a great improvement, although you might not think so from the photo below of it going in. It took a lot of effort not to lose track of which cable was which.
network-install1
Each of the grey cables has eight wires inside which have to be connected to the correct terminals on the new patch panels with a punchdown tool. That was several thousand wires to connect! In total we used over a kilometre of the grey ethernet cable.
network-install2
It all took a long time but means that the cabling is now much tidier and we’re very unlikely to pull out the wrong lead.

Posted in Network, Server rooms | Comments Off on Server room update

MATLAB R2014a available for Linux workstations

Posted on August 8, 2014 by Catherine E. Pitt

MATLAB R2014a is now available on the Ubuntu 14.04 (Trusty) Linux workstations. Load the matlab/R2014a module to use it. The default version of MATLAB is still R2013b.
We’re working on getting the newer version for the other operating systems.

Posted in Linux, Software | Comments Off on MATLAB R2014a available for Linux workstations