VSim Installation Instructions

Windows VSim Software Installation

The VSim distribution package for 64bit Windows is a self-extracting executable installer. Invoke the installer by double clicking on it. The default installation path is:

C:\Program Files\Tech-X (Win64)\VSim-11.0

where X is the minor version of your software. To open the VSim software, go to the Start Menu, click on the Tech-X folder, click on VSim 11.0, then click on VSimComposer. See Fig. 1.

Fig. 1 Dialogs for Windows installation

Windows VSim Software Installation on a Network Share

These instructions outline how to install VSim to a shared network location. This method will allow users from multiple machines to access and run this installation of VSim on their local machines.

To start, ensure that you have the shared network location that you want to install to. It is easy to find instructions on how to set up network file sharing on Windows, but the quick steps for Windows 10 are:

1. Open Windows File Explorer.
2. Navigate to the folder you wish to share.
3. Right-click the item and choose Properties.
4. In the Properties dialog click the Sharing tab.
5. Click the Share button.
6. In the Network access dialog, choose the people on your network to share the folder with and click the Share button.
7. In the next frame of the Network access dialog, note the names in the Individual Items list. There will be the name you assigned it in step (6) and the UNC (Unified Naming Convention) Path of the shared directory, which will have the form \MACHINEpathtoshareddirectory.
8. Click the Done button in the Network access dialog.
9. At this point you can change the UNC Path to a single string by clicking the Advanced Sharing… button and then clicking the Share checkbox and typing a string.
10. Click Close in the Properties dialog.

Now that this folder is accessible, install to the folder by following the Windows Installation instructions above. When you get to the “Choose Install Location” step, type in the shared location as your installation location or click the Browse button and navigate to it. Note that you first go to the Network machine in the left pane (not This PC) and then you navigate down in directories according to the UNC Shared Path. One can install VSim from the machine where the folder is shared from, or from another machine that has access to the shared folder.

When running VSim from a network location, one can map the UNC Shared Path to a network drive on any machine that has access to the path. To do this from Windows Explorer on the machine where VSim will be run, navigate to the second to last folder in the UNC Shared Path, right-click on the icon for the last folder, and select the Map Network Drive menu item. At this time you will be prompted to select a drive letter and can change a couple settings. After making your choices press Finish.

For a concrete example, say we have the follow values:

- Installation Computer Name = JANESCOMPUTER
- Shared Folder = C:\Users\jane\Documents\myshare
    (shared on JACKSCOMPUTER)
- Folder UNC Shared Path = \\JANESCOMPUTER\jane  (note here Jane
  has chosen the advanced option of a single name "jane" to represent
  the full path of \Users\jane\Documents\myshare)
- VSim installation Folder = C:\Users\jane\Documents\myshare\VSim
- Mapped Network Drive on JACKSCOMPUTER = S:\

So, for this example, the drive S:\ will show up on JACKSCOMPUTER and is mapped to \\JANESCOMPUTER\jane which is a share name for C:\Users\jane\Documents\myshare on JANESCOMPUTER. So, Jack should see S:\VSim as the installation location for VSim and he can conveniently run VSimComposer by double-clicking

S:\VSim\Contents\bin\VSimComposer.exe

Finally, to ensure all users have access to the license, the license should be copied to the Contents\engine\bin subdirectory next to the Vorpal engine. So, in our example, this would be on JANESCOMPUTER at the location:

C:\Users\jane\Documents\myshare\VSim\Contents\engine\bin\license.txt

inside the original installation of VSim. This is best done by using Windows Explorer rather than adding the license using the VSimComposer settings.

Windows Cluster VSim Software Installation

There are a few extra steps when installing on a Windows Cluster and we detail them here. VSim will work on a Windows cluster that uses Microsoft HPC Pack (Version 2012 R2 or later is required).

First, install VSim on the cluster headnode using the instructions above in the Network Share Section. The cluster license file will need to be copied into the correct location as described above and it will need to refer to the correct shared directory – normally a good choice for this directory would be a subdirectory of the UNC Shared Path alongside the VSim installation.

For operation on a Windows Cluster it is crucial to use the MPI that comes with Microsft HPC Pack. So, we must set aside the MPI that is distributed with VSim. Using the exmaple from the Network Share Section above, one would open a Command Prompt and execute the following commands:

S:\>cd VSim\Contents\engine\bin

S:\VSim\Contents\engine\bin>move mpiexec.exe mpiexecOFF.exe
      1 file(s) moved.

S:\VSim\Contents\engine\bin>move msmpi.dll msmpiOFF.dll
      1 file(s) moved.

This will ensure that the mpiexec.exe in the PATH variable will be the one on the system. This can be verified by the following:

S:\VSim\Contents\engine\bin>where mpiexec.exe
C:\Program Files\Microsoft MPI\Bin\mpiexec.exe

This completes the installation and now it can be tested using the Running Vorpal on a Windows HPC Cluster section of the VSim User Guide.

Now (also following the exmaple in the Network Share Section above), Jack can use VSimComposer to create a simulation directory (say mysim) in the shared folder, for example:

S:\jack\simulations\mysim

This directory and, therefore, the simulation input will then be available to all the nodes on the cluster when a job is submitted.

Linux VSim Software Installation

The VSim distribution package for Linux is a gzipped tarball. Unpack the gzipped tarball into the directory in which you wish to install VSim. A typical location would be

/usr/local/VSim-11.0

The unzip and untar command is

$ cd /usr/local
$ tar xf VSim-11.0.0-Linux64.tar.gz

Or, if your Linux machine does not have OpenGL rendering support then you may want to install the “offscreen” version, in which case the file would be “VSim-11.0.0-Linux64-offscreen.tar.gz. After untarring, the user interface is started with the command:

$ cd VSim-11.0
$ ./VSimComposer.sh

If you plan to run the simulation engine or any other executable from the command-line then you will need to source the startup script:

$ source /usr/local/VSim-11.0/VSimComposer.sh
<execute engine, analyzers, etc.>

See VSim User Guide: Running Vorpal from the Command Line for more instructions on command-line operations.

Mac OS X VSim Software Installation

Unpacking the DMG file:

The VSim distribution package for Mac OS X is a .dmg installer. Invoke the installer by double clicking on it. Drag the VSim-11.0 folder into your Applications folder (visible in the installer window). From the Application folder, double click on the VSimComposer icon in the VSim-11.0 folder. See Fig. 2. This default installation path is:

/Applications/VSim-11.0

Fig. 2 Dialog for the Mac installer

Workaround for signing issues:

As of El Capitan, Apple instituted GateKeeper, which by default prevents one from executing an unsigned application. The symptom can range from inability to install a license to being told the application is damaged as shown in Fig. 3.

Fig. 3 Warning that VSimComposer is damaged, put up by GateKeeper when code signing is not properly recognized.

If you are experiencing this, then close VSimComposer and open an XTerm and run the commands:

$ cd /Applications    # or wherever one has installed VSim-11
$ xattr -rd com.apple.quarantine VSim-11.0

Then reopen VSimComposer – the message should be gone.