CMPUT 201 Hardware/Software Requirements

In the labs you will solve C/C++ programming problems in a UNIX programming environment resembling the one installed in the UNIX labs CSC 153/159 (computers uf02..uf25.cs.ualberta.ca, ug02..ug34.cs.ualberta.ca)

Important: for this course you need to have access to a computer with reliable internet connection (ethernet preferred), video camera, microphone, and speakers (or headset) during all synchronous lecture and lab sessions

To setup a suitable software environment on your computer there are a few options:

On Windows, MacOS, and Linux you can use X2Go to access lab computers and have their desktops be streamed to a window on your computer. This works quite well, actually. It's almost like sitting in a UNIX lab, with all required software already installed.
A quick UofA tailored installation guide can be found here
For Lab 0 *all* students must install, configure, and test the X2Go client on their computer. This will allow you to participate in subsequent labs even if you run into issues with alternative installations!
Alternatively, if you run Linux or MacOS, you should be fine after installing the required programming tools, such as bash, gcc, g++, gdb, make, valgrind, and a suitable editor (e.g., emacs, vim, Visual Studio Code)
On Windows you can also host Ubuntu which is rather convenient:
- Install Ubuntu through the Windows store
- Enable rendering of GUI applications from Ubuntu/WLSS in Windows using a Windows X-server
- Install VxSrv on Windows
Alternatively, you could use Linux or Windows VMs or even dual-boot into Linux or Windows

Important: Submitted lab and assignment solutions will be evaluated on lab computers. This means that your programs can only contain standard C or C++ code. Also, if you choose any other software environment than X2Go then we won't be able to resolve any issues you might encounter

For a final test prior to submitting your work on eClass, if you are using X2Go (which you installed and configured prior to Lab 0 ...), just compile and run your programs

If you are not using X2Go, you should copy your source code to a lab computer using scp, log in using ssh, and compile and run your code to ensure there are no errors or warnings, and that it actually works - like so:

      me=my-ccid@ug??.cs.ualberta.ca  # e.g., r2d2@ug21.cs.ualberta.ca
      scp test.cpp $me:
      ssh $me
      g++ -Wall -Wextra test.cpp
      ./a.out

To test your setup, download hello.c and makefile and issue "make" in the directory you saved the files to

This should create file "hello" which you should be able to run by issuing "./hello"