This lab manual was prepared for the various Physics classes that use the departmental computer laboratories. If you are doing only web browsing (WebAssign), or editing simple Microsoft Office documents, the abbreviated chapter "SunRays for Windows Lovers" should suffice. For students using Unix, the chapters "Logging On and Doing Windows", "SunRay Utilities", and "The Bare Bones" should provide a quick introduction. Other chapters give more details and deal with special topics.
The Physics Department offers courses at three levels in computational physics.
Obtaining an Account and User Policy
Who can have an account in the Physics department, how to obtain one, and our user policy.
An abbreviated introduction to SunRays for students who only need to use a browser, or who want to edit a Microsoft Office document. Also, how to use personal USB memory drives with the SunRays.
An introduction to procedures for logging on and off, changing your password, and manipulating windows.
How to access the browser, mail utility, and Maple, how to edit simple Windows documents, and how to use a flash memory drive with our lab SunRay terminals.
Instructions for accessing physics machines from other campus machines or from off campus using telnet, rsh, ssh, ftp, etc.
Instructions for obtaining wireless access to the campus network. To log in to a physics account from your PC, see Remote Access above.
An introduction to the basics of Unix and the emacs text editor and how to compile simple C and Fortran programs.
emacs Reference Card or Postscript version
A summary of common emacs commands. There is also a printable Postscript version.
E-mail basics.
An assortment of notes on the use of Maple, the symbolic math package from the University of Waterloo.
Adapted from a lesson by Joe Zachary. See the "Bare Bones" above first.
More about g++, gcc, and g77 and an introduction to make and awk.
Summary of commonly used Unix commands.
How to compile C++, C or Fortran code with debugging hooks and run the gdb debugger.
Scientific subroutine packages
To be revised
We have LINPACK and LAPACK. These are scientific subroutine packages with hundreds of useful subroutines.
To be revised
axis and hist are local nonstandard plotting and histogramming programs. They are easy to use.
Copyright © 1995, 2001, 2006 Carleton DeTar Last modified: 17 August 2007