Using VALET

VALET, a module-like system developed and maintained at UD, makes it easy to manage your environment so you have access to the software that you use to conduct your work on Caviness. On a system like Caviness there are simultaneously many different software packages present, and many unique versions and variants of those packages. Some software is maintained by UD IT for all of the users of Caviness. Some software is maintained by individual workgroups or users. Having a single consistent mechanism for adding software into a shell's environment is of critical importance.

A VALET package definition describes the changes that must be made to the environment, such as adding directories to $PATH or $LD_LIBRARY_PATH so the system can find the executables and libraries associated with the package.

Package definitions maintained for all users by UD IT can be found in the /opt/shared/valet/etc directory
Users can create their own VALET package definition files in the ~/.valet directory
Workgroups can create VALET package definition files in the $WORKDIR/sw/valet directory

To determine what packages are available to you at any time, use the vpkg_list command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_list

Available packages:
  in /home/«user id»/.valet
    lolcow
  in /opt/shared/valet/2.1/etc
    abaqus
    ambertools
    anaconda
    arpack
    arpack-ng
      :
    valgrind
    vile
    vmd

To see what versions and variants of a package are available, use the vpkg_versions command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_versions intel

Available versions in package (* = default version):

[/opt/shared/valet/2.1/etc/intel.vpkg_yaml]
intel     Intel Compiler Suite
  2013    alias to intel/2013u6
  2013u6  Version 2013, SP1 Update 6 (2013_sp1.6.214)
  2015    alias to intel/2015u7
  2015u7  Version 2015, Update 7 (2015.7.235)
  2016    alias to intel/2016u5
  2016u5  Version 2016, Update 5 (2016.8.266)
  2017    alias to intel/2017u7
  2017u7  Version 2017, Update 7 (2017.7.259)
* 2018    alias to intel/2018u4
  2018u3  Version 2018, Update 3 (2018.3.222)
  2018u4  Version 2018, Update 4 (2018.5.274)
  2019    alias to intel/2019u2
  2019u2  Version 2019, Update 2 (2019.2.187)

A detailed list of the actions taken for a package or a version of a package can be displayed with the vpkg_info command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_info udunits/2.2.26
[udunits/2.2.26] {
  contexts: all
  udunits compiled with system compilers
  prefix: /opt/shared/udunits/2.2.26
  standard paths: {
    bin: /opt/shared/udunits/2.2.26/bin
    lib: /opt/shared/udunits/2.2.26/lib
    info: /opt/shared/udunits/2.2.26/share/info
    include: /opt/shared/udunits/2.2.26/include
  }
}

The vpkg_require command is used to add a package's changes to your environment. One or more versioned package identifiers can be passed to the command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_require intel/2019 ffmpeg/4.0 python/3.6.5
Adding package `intel/2019u2` to your environment
Adding package `ffmpeg/4.0` to your environment
Adding package `python/3.6.5` to your environment

Before making changes to the environment, VALET creates an environment snapshot that it can use to remove the changes it makes¹⁾.

Whenever possible, try to merge your package requests into as few vpkg_require commands as possible. This limits the number of environment snapshots that must be created and stored on disk.

To see what packages have been added to your environment, use the vpkg_history command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_history
[standard]
  intel/2019u2
  ffmpeg/4.0
  python/3.6.5

The changes produced by each invocation of vpkg_require can be rolled back using the vpkg_rollback command:

[«username»@login00 ~]$ which ifort
/opt/shared/intel/2019u2/compilers_and_libraries_2019.2.187/linux/bin/intel64/ifort
[«username»@login00 ~]$ vpkg_rollback
[«username»@login00 ~]$ which ifort
/usr/bin/which: no ifort in (/home/1001/bin:/opt/shared/valet/2.1/bin/bash:/opt/shared/valet/2.1/bin:/opt/shared/slurm/add-ons/bin:/opt/shared/slurm/bin:/usr/lib64/qt-3.3/bin:/opt/shared/gqueue/bin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/usr/sbin)

By default, vpkg_rollback undoes the last vpkg_require. To rollback the last N vpkg_require commands issued in your current shell, use vpkg_rollback N.

To undo all vpkg_require commands issued in your current shell, use vpkg_rollback all.

VALET includes several Linux manual (man) pages for online help:

Name	Section	Description
valet	7	General discussion of what VALET is, how it's used, etc. Good starting point.
vpkg_yaml	5	Outlines the YAML VALET package definition file format (see also the vpkg_json page); this is currently the preferred format
vpkg_json	5	Outlines the JSON VALET package definition file format (the YAML format is similar)
vpkg_xml	5	Outlines the XML VALET package definition file format; this was the original format and is now more or less deprecated in favor of YAML/JSON
vpkg_py	5	Outlines the Python package definition file format; there are two variants, literal and executable (dynamic), with availability of the latter determined by the sysadmin
vpkg_attr	1	Describes the `vpkg_attr` command
vpkg_devrequire	1	Describes the `vpkg_devrequire` command
vpkg_history	1	Describes the `vpkg_history` command
vpkg_info	1	Describes the `vpkg_info` command
vpkg_list	1	Describes the `vpkg_list` command
vpkg_require	1	Describes the `vpkg_require` command
vpkg_rollback	1	Describes the `vpkg_rollback` command
vpkg_versions	1	Describes the `vpkg_versions` command

¹⁾

Environment snapshots are stored in a directory created in $TMPDIR (or /tmp if $TMPDIR is not set).

Using VALET

Adding packages

Removing packages

Getting help