Installing numarray

If you plan to use Cantera from Python, or want to run any of the Python demo scripts, or use the graphical MixMaster application, then you need to install the 'numarray' package.

Numarray provides capabilities for Python to work efficiently work large matrices, and is used by the Cantera Python package.

Installing numarray on Windows

If you are using a PC running Windows, go to http://sourceforge.net/projects/numpy and download the Windows binary installer for numarray. All you need to do is to execute this installer to install numarray.

Building and Installing numarray on a unix-like platform

On a unix-like (linux, Mac OS X) platform, you need to build numarray from source code. The procedure to do this is largely automated, and takes only a few minutes. Here's what you do:

• Get the source code from http://sourceforge.net/projects/numpy. This file should have a name like numarray-1.x.x.tar.gz.
• Unpack the compresssed tar archive:

        gunzip numarray-1.x.x.tar.gz
        tar xvf numarray-1.x.x.tar 

• Go into the directory created by unpacking the archive, and type at a shell prompt

        python setup.py build 

  This compiles everything, and puts the files in a temporary directory, ready to be installed wherever you specify in the next step.

Installing numarray for all users

If your are the system administrator and want to install numaray so that every user can access it, then simply type

python setup.py install

You will probably have to run this command as super-user. Doing the install step this way will put the numarray module in the 'site-packages' subdirectory within the python 'lib' directory. This has the advantage that Python always looks in this directory for modules -- there is no need to set PYTHONPATH for the interpreter to find numarray. But it does require write access to the Python 'lib' directory, which typically only the system administrator has.

Installing a local version of numarray

If you are not the system administrator, then you can install a local version of numarray in your home directory by adding the --home option to the 'install' step. For example, if you want to install all numarray files within a directory named 'python_modules' in your home directory, then do this:

python setup.py build
python setup.py install --home=$HOME/python_modules

Note that if you use the --home option, you will need to configure Cantera so that it knows where to find numarray. To do this, you can either set environment variable NUMARRAY_HOME to the directory you specified with the --home option (e.g. $HOME/python_modules), or edit the cantera 'preconfig' script to set this variable there.