This document describes how to install the Inspect Tool contained in the inspect package. The following topics can be found in this document:
This section details the system requirements for installing and operating the Inspect Tool software.
The Inspect Tool software was developed using Python and will run on any platform with a supported Python environment. It is compatible with Python 2.6 or 2.7 (Python above 2.7.8 is recommended). It is not compatible with Python 2.5 or earlier versions; or currently with Python 3. The following commands test the local Python installation in a UNIX-based environment:
% which python
/usr/bin/python
% python --version
Python 2.7.12
The first command above checks whether the python executable is in the environment's path and the second command reports the version. If Python is not installed or the version is not 2.7 (python versions above 2.7.8 are recommended for easier installation of the Inspect Tool), Python will need to be downloaded and installed in the current environment. Consult the local system administrator for installation of this software on networked machines. Most systems should have both Python 2.7 and Python 3 installed. On local machines, current versions of python can be downloaded from Python download page
Download the inspect package from the PDS FTP site. The distribution is available in identical zip or tar/gzip packages. The installation directory may vary from environment to environment but in UNIX-based environments it is typical to install software packages in the /usr/local directory and in Windows-based environments it is typical to install software packages in the C:\Program Files directory. Unpack the selected binary distribution file in the installation directory for the local environment with one of the following commands:
% unzip inspect-0.3.0-bin.zip
or
% tar -xzvf inspect-0.3.0-bin.tar.gz
Note: Depending on the platform, the native version of tar may produce an error when attempting to unpack the distribution file because many of the file paths are greater than 100 characters. If available, the GNU version of tar will resolve this problem. If that is not available or cannot be installed, the zipped package will work just fine in a UNIX environment.
The commands above result in the creation of the inspect-0.3.0 directory with the following directory structure:
A README file directing the user to the available documentation for the project.
The copyright notice from the California Institute of Technology detailing the restrictions regarding the use and distribution of this software. Although the license is strictly worded, the software has been classified as Technology and Software Publicly Available (TSPA) and is available for anyone to download and use.
This directory contains Python scripts for launching and interacting with the software for UNIX-based and Windows environments.
This directory contains a local web site with the Inspect Tool documentation and other configuration management related information. Just point the desired web browser to the index.html file in this directory.
In order to manage and interact with the Inspect Tool, the local environment must first be configured appropriately. This section describes how to setup the user environment on UNIX-based and Windows machines.
This section details the environment setup for UNIX-based machines. The binary distribution includes a few shell scripts that must be executed from the command-line. Setting the PATH environment variable to the location of the scripts, enables the shell scripts to be executed from any location on the local machine.
The following command demonstrates how to set the PATH environment variable (in Bourne shell), by appending to its current setting:
% export PATH=${PATH}:/usr/local/inspect-0.3.0/bin
This section details the environment setup for Windows machines. The binary distribution includes a few batch scripts that must be executed from the command-line. Setting the PATH environment variable to the location of the files, enables the batch scripts to be executed from any location on the local machine.
The following command demonstrates how to set the PATH environment variable, by appending to its current setting:
C:\> set PATH = %PATH%;C:\Program Files\inspect-0.3.0\bin
Additional methods for setting Windows environment variables can be found in the Windows System Properties document.