Access
You can get a metal key to 2114 in room 5102 during key transaction hours (8:30-10:30 am?) with my signature on the propoer form. You will need a deposit check made out to UC Regents. You can also get access to Etcheverry added to your proxy key card for after hours access from the same place for an additional fee.
Equipment
There is a lot of delicate, expensive equipment in the lab. Please treat it with respect. If you want to demo something to a friend, supervise closely at all times and make sure they are also aware that this equipment can cost thousands or tens of thousands of dollars to repair/replace.
The head-tracked stereo glasses (CrystalEyes VR) are particularly vulnerable when they are plugged in, as pulling on the cord can cause the glasses to fall to the floor from where they were resting. Stepping on the cord can also damage it. Therefore, never leave the glasses plugged in to their controller box when you are through using them. Store them (and the non-headtracked glasses) in the foam tray next to the ImmersaDesk when not in use. It's okay to put them down briefly on the controller box while you are in the middle of testing (reducing potential energy), but don't leave them there when you're done. Also be sure that when you put them back in the foam tray that you fold up both arms of the glasses, because that turns them off. Otherwise the batteries drain really quickly (and when the batteries get low the head tracking gets really flaky.)
The haptic arms are delicate; don't exert excessive force on them. They are also potentially dangerous, as they can exert strong forces themselves, especially the large arm. For this reason it has a dual emergency stop mechanism: the rubber on the stylus is sensitive to your hand touching it and its forces will be cut if you let go, or if you press the big red emergency stop button its forces will be cut. Safety glasses are stored in the workbench and are recommended if you are using the large arm without the stereo glasses.
OSHA Requirements
Even though we don't have any chemicals in the lab, just to be paranoid about what those safety inspectors look for you should review and then sign the last page of the Chemical Hygiene Plan flipchart on the table by the door of the lab. If you work more than 4 hours a day on the computer, you should also have an ergonomic evaluation of the workstation. You can do a self-evaluation using the User-Friendly Workstation diagram and Personal Workstation Checklist on the UHS website.
Accounts
If you have just joined the lab, you will need a computer account. Contact the sysadmin at root(at-symbol)kingkong.me..., who can set it up for you (and fix any problems that arise later) [note, currently Rahul is setting up kingkong accounts so see him instead]. If you have been given an account with a temporary password, you will need to change it in three different places: first, log into one of the PCs in the lab, in the MEDEPT domain, using your temporary password, and change your PC password using Ctrl-Alt-Delete. Then use ssh to log into kingkong.me.berkeley.edu and change your Unix password using passwd. Finally, change you samba password on kingkong using smbpasswd.
On lindt we have VERY limited disk space on the main drive partition, which is perpetually full and then no one else can log on. You can help by not storing files on the desktop or in your "My Documents" folder and making sure that the internet browsers aren't creating huge caches. Log onto lindt and in IE, set the limit under tools, internet options..., general tab, settings... and in Netscape set it under Edit, preferences..., advanced, cache. Instead of storing local files on the desktop or "My Documents" folder on lindt (since these files are all stored on the main drive partition), make yourself a folder on lindt's H: drive which has plenty of room. Check the size of your folder in the "Documents and Settings" folder and clean up your desktop, your "My Documents" folder, etc. if it goes over 50MB.
Once all your passwords are set (and matching), you should be able to mount your Unix directory on the PC by mapping it as a network drive. Here is one way to do so: right-click on "My Computer" and choose "map network drive." Choose an unmapped drive, e.g. K for kingkong, as the "Drive" and enter \\kingkong\YOUR_LOGIN for the "Folder." Check the "Reconnect at logon" box, then click "Finish." Note that you will have to do this again to mount it for every PC you use, since we don't have roaming profiles. The Unix file system is backed up, but nothing is backed up locally on the PCs. Therefore, you should keep anything important in your Unix directory.
Under Unix we have set up a shared directory that anyone in the cadml group can write to. For historical reasons it is called "testdir." Since you can only mount your home directory in Windows, you should create a soft link in your home directory to the shared directory (i.e. ssh over to kingkong and type "ln -s /home/cadml/testdir ." while in your home directory). Note that your Unix account is set up so that your primary group is a group containing only yourself, and your .cshrc file sets umask 002. Thus in your home directory files will be group writeable by default, but only you can write to them. However, in testdir, which has group cadml with the magic-seeming property of having the "sticky bit" set, files or directories you create in Unix will also have group cadml and everyone in the group will be able to write to them. This is not true recursively, however: if you create subdirectories, the sticky bit will not be set automatically and files in them will have your individual group id. PLEASE use chgrp cadml <filenames> to change the group of all files and folders you create in testdir to cadml, and make sure they are all group writeable (e.g. by typing chmod 770 <filenames>). If you create a new folder in testdir, after you make it group writeable with chmod 770 <foldername>, you can set the sticky bit with chmod g+s <foldername>. Also note that if you copy files over from Windows to testdir the permissions (as well as the groups) will probably be wrong and you will have to change them manually in Unix with chmod and chgrp.
(When you first get your account, make sure it was set up with the correct groups under Unix - on kingkong, type the "groups" command and it should return two groups, the first being your user name and the second cadml. If this is not the case, contact the sysadmin.)
Standard campus computer use policies apply; note that other labs in the building have had their machines taken off the network for running file sharing programs.
CVS
We use CVS, the concurrent versioning system, for shared source code control, shared SolidWorks files, editing papers with multiple authors, etc. You should set your CVSROOT variable by adding the following line to your .cshrc file on kingkong using your favorite text editor:
setenv CVSROOT /home/cadml/testdir/cvsroot
If you have never used CVS or are a little rusty, I recommend this CVS tutorial. A detailed description of how to use the most important cvs commands can be found here.
Some CVS guidelines:
Electricity Usage
The ImmersaDesk should be put in "standby" mode (not off) when not in use, due to the 45 minute warm-up period to obtain a stable, calibrated image. But we should all get in the habit of turning off all equipment that doesn't have a long reboot/warmup time when we're done with it - monitors, the controller boxes for the phantom and headtracking, etc. The university's electric bill is causing a big deficit.
Additional CADML Webpages
Read and contribute to additional lab webpages put together by students working in the lab.
The Web and Research
Please also see my page on Electronic Library Resources.
Comments to Sara McMains