Software requested and installed in Linux VDI
The basic installation based on "Custom OS" (base environment in the left panel) with the following additional software (right panel): "Guest agents" + "Standard" + "System Tools". Then, under request by a number of parties, the following software has been manually added to the image.
| Software | Why is it needed? |
|---|---|
| Google Chrome | Widely supported browser |
| Microsoft Teams | ECMWF chat and collaboration tool |
| ecflow_ui | Managing suites. Requires qt5-qtsvg |
| dconf-editor | Easily manage Gnome user settings |
| gnome-tweaks | Useful Gnome extension |
| gnome-shell-extension-dash-to-dock | Useful Gnome extension |
| rclone | Access to OneDrive |
| LibreOffice | Ability to open and edit Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents |
| Java 11 | HPSS. Potentially prepifs |
| Gimp | Edition of screenshots and other image files for presentations, etc |
| KeePassXC | Centralised password management for users |
| xwd (part of xorg-x11-apps) | Powerful command-line tool for screenshots. ImageMagick also installed |
| nmon | More powerful than top to monitor the usage of resources in the CentOS 8 VM. It's installed in our workstation image |
| xfreerdp | Enable remote desktop connections to Windows servers |
| joe | Lightweight editor currently in our workstation image |
| geany | Lightweight IDE currently in our workstation image |
| emacs | Preferred editor |
| ksh | Preferred shell for rd and other users. Most operational scripts are ksh. It will be available in the Atos HPC as well |
| vmrc | VMware remote console to interact with VMs in vSphere |
| WireShark | Currently in the workstation, makes sensse to have it in Centos as well |
| JQ | Command-line JSON parser |
| gitk | Usually part of the standard Git install |
| xterm | Suggested for HPC team |
| ctags | Suggested for HPC team |
| ack | Suggested for HPC team |
| code (VS code editor) | Preferred IDE |
| forticlient | Fortinet VPN client to be able to connect to the datacentre in Bologna |
| Sublime | Text editor including command-line editing tool (subl) |
| FFmpeg | For handling multimedia files and streams |
| pgadmin4 | To connect to and manage PostgreSQL databases |
| terminator | Another choice of multi-tabbed terminal emulator |
| seahorse | Must-have to be able to manage gnome keyrings |
| meld | Visual diff and merge tool very useful to developers |
| nedit | Another choice of editor |
| ansible | Requested by DHS and Service Reliability teams |
| Python | 3.6 and 3.8.8 |
| podman | Docker was requested but requires root / sudo, which would be a security risk, so we provide rootless podman as an alternative. Although it's installed for convenience, bear in mind that VDI is a non-persistent environment, and container development should happen in other platforms |
| krusader | Powerful double-pane file manager that used to be installed in our old Leap42 workstations |
| gnuplot | Very useful command-line tool for plotting scientific data, also included in our old Leap42 workstations |
| mysql clients | MySQL standard client and MySQL Workbench installed (version8) |
| Lyx, Latex | Required by scientists |
| tig | Useful add-on for git (browser and pager for git repos) |
| Kakoune | kak is a vi alternative for users that are more comfortable with it |
The Silver Searcher | ag is a very fast code searching tool similar to ack |
X.Org X11 Protocol headers | xorg-x11-proto-devel package |
| Grace | 2D data plotting tool |
Software requested but not installed
The reason is usually there is and alternative or that the request software is better run in another platform, like for example data processing tools or ECMWF software packages, that should be run in the HPC platform. See System overview - Linux Virtual Desktop VDI
| Software package | Alternative or reason to reject |
|---|---|
| Thunderbird | IMAP is not generally supported. The only supported email clients are Outlook and Outlook Web |
| iftop | |
| NetCDF | Data processing should happen on the HPC platform |
| Metview | Data processing should happen on the HPC platform |