cs24-21fa Environment Setup

Introduction to Computing Systems (Fall 2021)

We have changed the recommended setup from CS 3; so, even if you already did some of these steps, please do them all again. Your computing environment for CS 24 will consist of working with a remote system (labradoodle.caltech.edu). In this course, we will be using Visual Studio Code to keep everything consistent.

Installing Visual Studio Code

Start by downloading VSCode here: https://code.visualstudio.com/download, then follow the instructions to install it. Once it finishes, search for blank.caltech-vscode-extension-pack in the extensions view (Cmd+Shift+X), and install the extension pack that comes up.

Setting Up labradoodle.caltech.edu

To find your username and password for the remote system, go to here: https://grinch.caltech.edu/cs24-21fa.

Now, we need to set up our remote connection to labradoodle.caltech.edu. Go to the “Remote Explorer” view, and click the plus button on the top next to “SSH Targets”. In the window that pops up, type ssh USERNAME@labradoodle.caltech.edu, and click enter. Select the first option and click on the plus. When it prompts for your password at the top, type in your password from above. If it also asks you which OS configuration, choose “Linux”. Once it (finally) connects, search for blank.caltech-vscode-extension-pack in the extensions view (Cmd+Shift+X), and install the extension pack that comes up. This will install all the necessary extensions for this course on the remote server. Depending on your operating system and past experience, you may have to install git manually from this website: https://git-scm.com/downloads

Type Ctrl+~ to open up a terminal and it will print out an SSH key which you should copy to the gitlab keys page here: https://gitlab.caltech.edu/profile/keys.

Then, run the following commands (Note that you WILL NOT have to run these ever again):

Terminal

me@labradoodle:~$ mkdir ~/cs24
me@labradoodle:~$ chmod 700 ~/cs24
me@labradoodle:~$ cd ~/cs24

Finally, you are ready to create and “clone” your project repository. First, go to the registration tool and register for the project: https://grinch.caltech.edu/register. Then, go to the Explorer view (Cmd+Shift+E) and click “Clone Repository”. Type in the git path for cloning which can be found on the registration page and in the e-mail sent to you. It should look something like git@gitlab.caltech.edu:cs24-20fa/project00-blank.git. Finally, type “cs24” into the window that pops up and type enter.