Installing IRAF on Fedora 8

It took me quite some time to install IRAF (V2.14) on my laptop, mainly because of some errors I got on the way. Below I will try to explain the installation steps, in case someone ever gets stuck in similar problems.

1. Creating the IRAF user account

If you’re not an expert in Linux, the easiest way to create a new user is by going to

K Menu > Administration > Users and Groups

If you are logged in as a normal user, it will ask you to introduce the root password. Go ahead with this, and then click on Add User. A new window will appear. For User Name write iraf, for Full Name you can write anything, choose a password for the new account, for the Login Shell choose /bin/csh or /bin/tcsh (I use csh), set the Home Directory to /home/iraf/local, and leave all other options set to their default values.

These steps should create a new directory in the folder /home/, at least that’s what I supposed. For me it didn’t work like that, so I created the directory manually, with

$ su –

$ mkdir /home/iraf

$ mkdir /home/iraf/local

and then I copied the folders (Desktop, Documents, etc.) from my other account (/home/georgiana) in the iraf home directory with

$ cp -f /home/georgiana/* /home/iraf/local

Now you should fix the owners/permission issues. You can do this with

$ chown -R iraf /home/iraf

$ chgrp -R iraf /home/iraf

$ chmod 777 /home/iraf

After you do all this, log into your IRAF account.

2. Creating the directory tree

I will just write below the directory tree I have. You should be able to create the (empty) directories using the command mkdir (you don’t have to log in as root to do this; if you do, then it means you have some problems with the permissions to the folder /home/iraf/).

$ /home/iraf

$ /home/iraf/local

$ /home/irafbin

$ /home/irafbin/bin.redhat

$ /home/irafbin/noao.bin.redhat

$ /home/extern

$ /home/extern/mscred

$ /home/extern/stsdas

$ /home/x11iraf

3. Downloading and unpacking the installation packages

You can do this via FTP from the terminal, but the easiest way to do it if you’re not to much into Linux is to go on the IRAF website – http://iraf.noao.edu/. The RedHat/Fedora packages you need are AS, IB, and NB. Save the AS package to /home/iraf, the IB package to /home/irafbin/bin.redhat, and the NB package to /home/irafbin/noao.bin.redhat.

From the terminal, unpack the AS package with

$ cd /home/iraf

$ cat as.pcix.gen.gz | zcat | tar -xpf –

the IB package with

$ cd /home/irafbin/bin.redhat

$ cat ib.rhux.x86.gz | zcat | tar -xpf –

and the NB package with

$ cd /home/irafbin/noao.bin.redhat

$ cat nb.rhux.x86.gz | zcat | tar -xpf –

4. Run a trial installation (don’t skip this, it’s useful :p)

You do this with

$ setenv iraf /home/iraf/

$ cd /home/iraf/unix/hlib

$ source irafuser.csh

$ ./install -n

Set the directories you are asked for to

New iraf root directory (/home): /home/iraf

Default root image storage directory (/home/iraf/imdirs): /home/iraf/imdirs

Local unix commands directory (/usr/local/bin): /usr/local/bin

I didn’t get any errors in this part, so if you do have problems, I would suggest you read through the installation manual (they give some common mistakes, errors, etc. there). Try to fix any warnins or errors before proceeding with the actual installation.

If everything is OK (or if you only get warnings, and not errors) you will be asked proceed with the installation. You can choose ‘no’ for the moment.

5. Install IRAF

Log in as superuser (root) with

$ su –

Now repeat the same steps as above, but do not write the -n in the ./install command:

$ setenv iraf /home/iraf/

$ cd /home/iraf/unix/hlib

$ source irafuser.csh

$ ./install

Choose the same directories as above, and when asked if you want to proceed with the installation say ‘yes’. You will be prompted with whether to continue with the post-install configuration; choose ‘yes’.

6. Post-install configuration

I managed to use all the IRAF commands I tried until now with the configuration I will write below. However, in case something does not work, it might be useful to consult the Unix IRAF Site Manager’s Guide (you can find it on the IRAF website).

Configure IRAF Networking on this machine? (yes): n

Create a default tapecap file? (yes): y

Do you wish to create a default dev$tapecap link? (yes): y

Do you wish to delete these unused HSI binaries? (yes): n

Do you wish to strip the system of sources? (no): y

Log out of root by typing logout in the terminal.

Until this point, everything ran smoothly for me. However, I had problems using mkiraf and cl. You can see below what I did to solve them.

7. MKIRAF

When I first tried using the command mkiraf, I got an error saying that the command was not found. If you did all the steps as above, you can fix this by typing

$ /usr/local/bin/mkiraf

instead of

$ mkiraf

Somehow, the command is not found automatically, so you have to specify the full path to it. Be careful, because you have to do this from a folder in which you want your IRAF stuff to be, not from one of the folders in which you have just installed the IRAF components.

8. CL

Then, by simply typing cl you again get

cl: Command not found

so instead you should specify the full path, which is

/usr/local/bin/cl

I thought this will work nicely, but I got another error saying

/iraf/iraf/bin.redhat/ecl.e: error while loading shared libraries: libtermcap.so.2: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory.

I googled a bit about this error, but all I got were some websites written in Japanese (I think). In the end, I figured it out that all I had to do is to install two missing packages in Fedora: libtermcap and libtermcap-devel. You can do this by going to

System > Add/Remove Software > [enter root password] > Search

and in the search field type libtermcap and click Search. Two packages are found (the ones mentioned above); select both of them and install them.

Now you can go back to the terminal, and in the folder where you want your IRAF files to be (again, not the ones created during installation) type cl.

With a bit of luck, this should do the trick and you can start using IRAF. Just as a note, only the installation has to be done in the IRAF account. You can use IRAF on all your other Linux accounts.