Software Carpentry: University of Sheffield

General Information

Software Carpentry's mission is to help scientists and engineers get more research done in less time and with less pain by teaching them basic lab skills for scientific computing. This hands-on workshop will cover basic concepts and tools, including program design, version control, data management, and task automation. Participants will be encouraged to help one another and to apply what they have learned to their own research problems.

For more information on what we teach and why, please see our paper "Best Practices for Scientific Computing".

Who: The course is aimed at graduate students and other researchers. You don't need to have any previous knowledge of the tools that will be presented at the workshop. In the first two days we will cover the all the tools required in modern scientific research. The thrid day will be a shorter day with discussions on open source science and contributing to software packges. There will also be the opportunity to present your work, an idea or cool problem in a relaxed environment during a lightning talk session. The second two days will be focused on handling astrophysical data sets in Python. The focus will be on SunPy, however the skills learnt here are extremely transferable.

Where: Lecture Theatre 10, Hicks Building, Housfield Rd, S3 7RH, Yorkshire. Get directions with OpenStreetMap or Google Maps.

Requirements: Participants must bring a laptop with a few specific software packages installed (listed below). They are also required to abide by Software Carpentry's Code of Conduct.

Contact: Please mail s.m.bennett@sheffield.ac.uk for more information.

Schedule

Day 1

Arrival	Pre-workshop Survey
09:00	Introduction and laptop fixing
09:30	Automating tasks with the Unix shell
10:50	Coffee
11:10	Further Unix
12:30	Lunch break
13:30	Version Control with Git
14:50	Coffee
15:10	Further Git
16:30	Wrap-up

Day 2

09:30	Building programs with Python
10:50	Coffee
11:10	Conitinuing programs with Python
12:30	Lunch break
13:30	Further Python
14:50	Coffee
15:10	Grand Exersise
16:00	Wrap-up

Day 3

10:00	Open Astronomy
10:30	Contributing to open source software
11:00	Tea and Coffee
11:30	Lightning Talks

Day 4

09:30	Units and Quantities
10:50	Tea and Coffee
11:10	Images and Plotting
12:30	Lunch
13:30	Images in Astronomy
14:50	Tea and Coffee
15:10	AstroPy Tables
16:30	Wrap

Day 5

09:30	Obtaining Solar and Astronomical data
10:50	Tea and Coffee
11:10	Time Series Data
12:45	Lunch
14:00	Grand Exersice
16:00	Wrap and a survey

Etherpad: https://public.etherpad-mozilla.org/p/Sheffield_Python_SunPy.
We will use this Etherpad for chatting, taking notes, and sharing URLs and bits of code.

Syllabus

The Unix Shell

Files and directories
History and tab completion
Pipes and redirection
Looping over files
Creating and running shell scripts
Finding things
Reference...

Programming in Python

Using libraries
Working with arrays
Reading and plotting data
Creating and using functions
Loops and conditionals
Defensive programming
Using Python from the command line
Reference...

Version Control with Git

Creating a repository
Recording changes to files: add, commit, ...
Viewing changes: status, diff, ...
Ignoring files
Working on the web: clone, pull, push, ...
Resolving conflicts
Open licenses
Where to host work, and why
Reference...

Setup

To participate in a Software Carpentry workshop, you will need access to the software described below. In addition, you will need an up-to-date web browser.

We maintain a list of common issues that occur during installation as a reference for instructors that may be useful on the Configuration Problems and Solutions wiki page.

The Bash Shell

Bash is a commonly-used shell that gives you the power to do simple tasks more quickly.

Windows

Download the Git for Windows installer.
Run the installer and follow the steps bellow:
1. Click on "Next".
2. Click on "Next".
3. Click on "Next".
4. Click on "Next".
5. Click on "Next".
6. Select "Use Git from the Windows Command Prompt" and click on "Next". If you forgot to do this programs that you need for the workshop will not work properly. If this happens rerun the installer and select the appropriate option.
7. Click on "Next". Keep "Checkout Windows-style, commit Unix-style line endings" selected.
8. Select "Use Windows' default console window" and click on "Next".
9. Click on "Next".
10. Click on "Finish".

This will provide you with both Git and Bash in the Git Bash program.

Mac OS X

The default shell in all versions of Mac OS X is Bash, so no need to install anything. You access Bash from the Terminal (found in /Applications/Utilities). You may want to keep Terminal in your dock for this workshop.

Linux

The default shell is usually Bash, but if your machine is set up differently you can run it by opening a terminal and typing bash. There is no need to install anything.

Git

Git is a version control system that lets you track who made changes to what when and has options for easily updating a shared or public version of your code on github.com. You will need a supported web browser (current versions of Chrome, Firefox or Safari, or Internet Explorer version 9 or above).

Windows

Git should be installed on your computer as part of your Bash install (described above).

Mac OS X

For OS X 10.9 and higher, install Git for Mac by downloading and running the most recent "mavericks" installer from this list. After installing Git, there will not be anything in your /Applications folder, as Git is a command line program. For older versions of OS X (10.5-10.8) use the most recent available installer labelled "snow-leopard" available here.

Linux

If Git is not already available on your machine you can try to install it via your distro's package manager. For Debian/Ubuntu run sudo apt-get install git and for Fedora run sudo yum install git.

Text Editor

When you're writing code, it's nice to have a text editor that is optimized for writing code, with features like automatic color-coding of key words. The default text editor on Mac OS X and Linux is usually set to Vim, which is not famous for being intuitive. if you accidentally find yourself stuck in it, try typing the escape key, followed by :q! (colon, lower-case 'q', exclamation mark), then hitting Return to return to the shell.

Windows

nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. To install it, download the Software Carpentry Windows installer and double click on the file to run it. This installer requires an active internet connection.

Others editors that you can use are Notepad++ or Sublime Text. Be aware that you must add its installation directory to your system path. Please ask your instructor to help you do this.

Mac OS X

nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. It should be pre-installed.

Others editors that you can use are Text Wrangler or Sublime Text.

Linux

nano is a basic editor and the default that instructors use in the workshop. It should be pre-installed.

Others editors that you can use are Gedit, Kate or Sublime Text.

Python

Python is a popular language for scientific computing, and great for general-purpose programming as well. Installing all of its scientific packages individually can be a bit difficult, so we recommend Anaconda, an all-in-one installer.

Regardless of how you choose to install it, please make sure you install Python version 2.7.

We will teach Python using the IPython notebook, a programming environment that runs in a web browser. For this to work you will need a reasonably up-to-date browser. The current versions of the Chrome, Safari and Firefox browsers are all supported (some older browsers, including Internet Explorer version 9 and below, are not).

Windows

Open http://continuum.io/downloads with your web browser.
Download the Python 2.7 installer for Windows.
Install Python 2.7 using all of the defaults for installation except make sure to check Make Anaconda the default Python.

Mac OS X

Open http://continuum.io/downloads with your web browser.
Download the Python 2.7 installer for OS X.
Install Python 2.7 using all of the defaults for installation.

Linux

Open http://continuum.io/downloads with your web browser.
Download the Python 2.7 installer for Linux.
Install Python 2.7 using all of the defaults for installation. (Installation requires using the shell. If you aren't comfortable doing the installation yourself stop here and request help at the workshop.)
Open a terminal window.
Type
```
bash Anaconda-
```
and then press tab. The name of the file you just downloaded should appear.
Press enter. You will follow the text-only prompts. When there is a colon at the bottom of the screen press the down arrow to move down through the text. Type yes and press enter to approve the license. Press enter to approve the default location for the files. Type yes and press enter to prepend Anaconda to your PATH (this makes the Anaconda distribution the default Python).

Once you are done installing the software listed above, please go to this page, which has instructions on how to test that everything was installed correctly.

SunPy

Given that you have installed python using anaconda, we can use the anaconda environment to install SunPy too.

To install SunPy launch a system command prompt or the ‘Anaconda Command Prompt’ (under Windows).

Configure conda for sunpy downloads:

 conda config --add channels sunpy --add channels astropy

Then to install SunPy
```
 conda install sunpy astroquery 
```