SE 2F03 Frequently Asked Questions

How can I run PVS or IMPS at on my own home PC?

You can run PVS and IMPS on a PC running the Linux operating system. Follow the link for PVS info. I've got PVS working on my Sony Vaio laptop (600 MHz Celeron with 512 MB RAM) under Fedora Code 2 Linux (note that kernel version 2.6.8 has a bug in it that breaks PVS). I've also used PVS with other Linux distribution such as Debian, Mandrake and RedHat 9.0. To learn about the Linux operating system, check out the Linux Documentation Project.

You can also run PVS and IMPS remotely provided you have an X server on your system (see below).
How do I run PVS or IMPS remotely on the Suns (e.g. from residence or home)?

Connect to mills with the command: ssh mills.mcmaster.ca

You can run the software on mills and display it on any system with an X server by doing the following.
1. On your local machine add mills to the access list of xhosts: xhost +mills (if you are off campus you would "xhost mills.cas.mcmaster.ca") 2. ssh to mills. 3. On mills, set the display to your local machine. E.g. setenv DISPLAY yourhost.yourdomain:0.0 (here "yourhost" is the name of the machine you are at.) (instead of the full hostname, you can also use your IP address.) 4. Start the software you want to use on mills with the appropriate command. E.g. to start pvs: pvs
NOTE: You need a reasonably fast connection to do this.
Where can I get an X Server?

An X server is a standard part of any Linux distribution and there are various commercial and "free" versions for Windows and MacOS systems (google it!).
How do I print multiple pages of the notes, etc. on a single page?

First print the PDF to a postscript file. You can print multiple pages from the postscript file with the "mpage" command. For instance, you can print the notes in the 4 slides/page format using the command:
mpage -4 slides_filename.ps | lpr You can also convert a .ps file to a multipage per printed page file on mills or any Linux box and then ftp the page and print it at home if you like. "man mpage" for more details. If you want to have PDF files with 4 slides per page, just convert you 4/page PS file to PDF with the command: ps2pdf slidesx.ps slidesx.pdf

Mark Lawford

Last modified: Fri Sep 10 23:34:01 EDT 2004