[this multipart mesaage has a funny format and confusing my mailer - so replying thus..]
On Sat, 27 Apr 2013, Barry Smith wrote: > > Satish, > > Since installing PETSc is so difficult how hard would it be Its usually difficult for user specific settings - and VM/server doesn't adress this primary issue. > > 1) provide an entire linux image with PETSc installed and user account > already there that people can run in a VM on their machine? A simple install on windows can be done via cygwin [with gcc/gfortran etc.]. A VM will tradeoff installing cygwin with a installing/managing/VM+linux The last I checked - a linux VM install with all the required developer tools [and a useable minimal X-desktop] takes 2G or more. [I don't think its a big deal for us to host such a big download - but users would have to deal with the VM issues. Usually these a compressed with .xz to minimize footprint] > > 2) allow people to log into a VM on a server with PETSc already installed and > user account created for them automatically either > > a) on some machines we maintain or > b) on some Amazon/..../... server system? We would be in account-management game instead here. Jed was previously proposing having the above image available on amazon - and users would just run instances of it the way they need it.. Satish
