= UnixSetup =

== Your dot files (.brc and .benv) ==

on DICE, there are two files that define the unix environment. {{{.brc}}}, which gets loaded for each terminal/bash, and {{{.benv} which gets loaded only once for the first bash (when you login). The reason for the two files is that only some characteristics of the shell environment get inherited. In particular, alias do not, but environment variables do. See: http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/systems/support/FAQ/index.html#J1

To set up your bash environment (that's the command line shell where you type things in) to make it work with group stuff, you should have/make a {{{~/.brc}}} file (even if you didn't have one before), as well as a {{{~/.benv}}} file. 

Your {{{.benv}}} should have the following at the top: 

{{{
MRG_DOT_BENV=/group/reason/dream/env/MRG_DOT_BENV
if [ $MRG_DOT_BENV ] && [ -f $MRG_DOT_BENV ];
then
. $MRG_DOT_BENV
fi
}}}


Your {{{.brc}}} should have the following at the top: 

{{{
MRG_DOT_BRC=/group/reason/dream/env/MRG_DOT_BRC
if [ $MRG_DOT_BRC ] && [ -f $MRG_DOT_BRC ];
then
. $MRG_DOT_BRC
fi
}}}

You can add any personal setting after this. 

The environment variables {{{$MRGDIR}}}, {{{$MRGLIB}}}, etc point to our shared files. bash completion on "$MRG" will list these for you (type tab twice after {{{$MRG}}} ). 



== More Tricks ==

=== Beeping ===

To stop your computer beeping at you, add to your {{{~/.inputrc}}} file the following: 

{{{set bell-style visible}}}

=== Looking People Up ===

Under the DICE environment students, including postgrads, have usernames which are absolutely no use whatsoever to humans trying to identify them unless you have an excellent memory for 7 digit numbers.

This can cause problems when, for example, someone is running a process on your machine that's slowing it down and you want them to nice it (it's probably me ;-), or someone has a crashed job on the print queue or has accidentally sent 30 copies of a 100 page document etc.

You can find out who it is by using 'finger', but this can be very slow. A faster way to look up the name assosciated with a student ID is to do an LDAP search, e.g.

{{{
$ ldapsearch uid=s9811254 2>&1 | grep cn:
cn: Laura Meikle
}}}

That's a lot to type, so you might consider adding something like

{{{
function edwho ()
{ 
command ldapsearch uid=$1 2>&1 | grep cn: 
}
}}}

to your {{{.bashrc}}} then you can do things like:

{{{
$ edwho s9900905
cn: Fiona McNeill
}}}

As you might expect, ldapsearch also works for less obfuscated usernames, e.g:

{{{
$ edwho dr
cn: Dave Robertson
}}}

=== Changing your prompt ===

If you want the bash prompt option "PS1" to work- i.e. what it says at the beginning of every command line, then you will need to put it in your .bashrc file:

{{{
# more sensible default prompt
export PS1='\h[${PWD##*/}] '
}}}

The difference between the relevant dot files for DICE is explained at the [http://www.inf.ed.ac.uk/systems/support/FAQ/#J1 DICE FAQ]