Install User Programs in Session Containers

Sometimes you need new programs or libraries that are not installed in your environment. If so, you can install the new program into your environment.

NOTE: Newly installed programs are not environment dependent. It is installed in the user directory.

Install packages with linuxbrew

If you are a macOS user and a researcher or developer who occasionally installs unix programs, you may be familiar with homebrew <https://brew.sh>. You can install new programs using linuxbrew in Backend.AI.

Creating a user linuxbrew directory

Directories that begin with a dot are automatically mounted when the session starts. Create a linuxbrew directory that will be automatically mounted so that programs you install with linuxbrew can be used in all sessions.

Create .linuxbrew in the Storage section.

With CLI:

$ backend.ai vfolder create .linuxbrew

Let’s check if they are created correctly.

$ backend.ai vfolder list

Also, you can create a directory using GUI console with same name.

Installing linuxbrew

Start a new session for installation. Choose your environment and allocate the necessary resources. Generally, you don’t need to allocate a lot of resources, but if you need to compile or install a GPU-dependent library, you need to adjust the resource allocation to your needs.

In general, 1 CPU / 4GB RAM is enough.

$ sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Linuxbrew/install/master/install.sh)"

Testing linuxbrew

Enter the brew command to verify that linuxbrew is installed. In general, to use linuxbrew you need to add the path where linuxbrew is installed to the PATH variable.

Enter the following command to temporarily add the path and verify that it is installed correctly.

$ brew

Setting linuxbrew environment variables automatically

To correctly reference the binaries and libraries installed by linuxbrew, add the configuration to .bashrc. You can add settings from the settings tab.

Example: Installing and testing htop

To test the program installation, let’s install a program called htop. htop is a program that extends the top command, allowing you to monitor the running computing environment in a variety of ways.

Let’s install it with the following command:

$ brew install htop

If there are any libraries needed for the htop program, they will be installed automatically.

Now let’s run:

$ htop

From the run screen, you can press q to return to the terminal.

1.6 Deleting the linuxbrew Environment

To reset all programs installed with linuxbrew, just delete everything in the .linuxbrew directory.

Note: If you want to remove a program by selecting it, use the brew uninstall [PROGRAM_NAME] command.

$ rm -rf ~/.linuxbrew/*

Install packages with miniconda

Some environments support miniconda. In this case, you can use miniconda <https://docs.conda.io/projects/conda/en/latest/user-guide/install/> to install the packages you want.

Creating a user miniconda-required directory

Directories that begin with a dot are automatically mounted when the session starts. Create a .conda, .continuum directory that will be automatically mounted so that programs you install with miniconda can be used in all sessions.

Create .conda, .continuum in the Storage section.