F.A.Q.

What is the difference between Conda, Miniconda, Anaconda, and AstroConda?

  • Conda is a user-land environment and package management utility maintained by Continuum Analytics, Inc.
  • Miniconda is distributed by Continuum Analytics, Inc. as a standalone installer, and provides a minimal conda-based environment (i.e. conda and python)
  • Anaconda is distributed by Continuum Analytics, Inc. as a standalone installer, and provides a fully featured conda-based environment (i.e. conda, python, and commonly used utilities, libraries, and Python packages).
  • AstroConda is a collection of Conda packages, also known as a “Conda Channel”, to be used with existing Miniconda and Anaconda installations via conda create, conda install, and conda update.

Note: Package recipes are freely available on GitHub and are maintained by the Science Software Branch (SSB) of the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI).

Why do you recommend installing Miniconda instead of Anaconda?

Miniconda (~100MBs) has a significantly smaller footprint than Anaconda (~1GBs). However, you are free to continue using Anaconda as your base installation if it suits your personal needs.

If I already have Miniconda or Anaconda installed, do I need to reinstall it to use AstroConda?

No. Adding our channel URL to your current configuration with conda config --add should suffice.

Does AstroConda provide an installation script similar to Miniconda or Anaconda?

No. AstroConda requires Miniconda or Anaconda to be installed prior to installing packages from the AstroConda channel.

Could not find URL: http://ssb.stsci.edu/astroconda/...

This error may occur if...

  • You are not connected to the internet
  • Your network requires a proxy (outside the scope of this FAQ)
  • STScI is experiencing a network or power outage
  • The AstroConda package repository crashed or rebooted due to routine patching

If you have verified your internet connection is functioning properly but our parent site (http://www.stsci.edu) is unresponsive, then feel free to try our mirror.

Currently there are two ways to access it:

Using conda directly

The basic conda installation commands accept -c or --channel argument, which allows you to select a different repository to install packages from.

conda {create|install|update} [-n name] -c http://astroconda.org/channel/main [[pkg] ...]

# Examples
conda create -n astroconda -c http://astroconda.org/channel/main stsci
conda install -n astroconda -c http://astroconda.org/channel/main webbpsf
conda update -n astroconda -c http://astroconda.org/channel/main --all

Using a modified .condarc

If our primary AstroConda channel appears to be down for longer than ten minutes, and the direct method isn’t convenient, you can add the URL to your ~/.condarc configuration.

channels:
  #- http://ssb.stsci.edu/astroconda
  - http://astroconda.org/channel/main
  - defaults

We recommend against using the astroconda.org mirror on a regular basis. The bandwidth and hardware are not better or faster than the primary server. If the reason for switching to the mirror has been resolved, you should go back to using the primary.

After “conda create -n ...” why does “source activate astroconda” fail?

Conda does not support CSH (C-Shell). Please switch to a POSIX-compatible shell (e.g. BASH, KSH, ZSH).

Note

STScI will not maintain a separate codebase of conda in order to implement CSH support. Feel free to create an issue with the developers.

What do you mean by Conda “root” environment?

The root environment refers to the top-level directory structure created by the Miniconda or Anaconda installer. The package manager, Conda, resides under /home/username/*conda/bin. So for example, if you execute source deactivate your PATH environment variable is reset to point to the root environment. Thus, installing software at this level will be installed in the root bin directory too.

Please refrain from installing any software into the root environment with either pip or conda. It is recommended to always create a new environment with conda create and install new software into it. It is far easier to delete a broken environment with conda env remove than it is to reinstall Miniconda or Anaconda in its entirety. Custom environments are safely abstracted away from the root and live under /home/username/*conda/envs/<name>.

I installed AstroConda packages into my [Mini/Ana]conda ‘root’ environment. What now?

Please reinstall Miniconda (or Anaconda) from scratch. AstroConda uses source activate and source deactivate calls to control your shell environment. The Anaconda ‘root’ environment does not use this feature, and thus, the packages you have installed there will not work properly.

To clarify, installing AstroConda packages directly into the ‘root’ may cause Miniconda (or Anaconda) itself to be come unstable. In addition to this, removing packages from this environment is tedious and will likely break your Anaconda installation if you are not careful. Reinstalling from scratch is the safest option.

How do I reinstall Miniconda?

This assumes Miniconda3 has been installed to the default location (/home/username/miniconda3). We will refer to your home directory as ~/ from here on.

# Make a backup of your existing installation if desired:
$ tar cfz /safe/place/miniconda3_OLD.tar.gz ~/miniconda3

# Remove Miniconda3
$ rm -rf ~/miniconda3

# Download the Miniconda3 installer for your platform from: http://conda.io/miniconda.html

# Execute the installer (where PLATFORM is one of Linux or MacOSX)
$ bash /path/to/Miniconda3-latest-PLATFORM-x86_64.sh

The installer may offer to automatically edit ~/.bash_profile and prepend ~/miniconda3/bin to your PATH. If you already have this entry in your PATH, simply respond with ‘no’. Responding with ‘yes’ will add another entry even if it exists resulting in a PATH that looks much like: ~/miniconda3/bin:~/miniconda3/bin:[...].

How do I reinstall Anaconda?

This assumes Anaconda3 has been installed to the default location (/home/username/anaconda3). We will refer to your home directory as ~/ from here on.

# Make a backup of your existing installation if desired:
$ tar cfz /safe/place/anaconda3_old.tar.gz ~/anaconda3

# Remove anaconda3
$ rm -rf ~/anaconda3

# Download the Anaconda3 installer for your platform from: https://www.continuum.io/downloads
# (Note: Use the "COMMAND-LINE INSTALLER")

# Execute the installer (where VERSION is the version you downloaded, and  PLATFORM is one of Linux or MacOSX)
$ bash /path/to/Anaconda3-VERSION-PLATFORM-x86_64.sh

The installer may offer to automatically edit ~/.bash_profile and prepend ~/anaconda3/bin to your PATH. If you already have this entry in your PATH, simply respond with ‘no’. Responding with ‘yes’ will add another entry even if it exists resulting in a PATH that looks much like: ~/anaconda3/bin:~/anaconda3/bin:[...].

Why am I being prompted by NumPy/SciPy with a MKL 30-day trial warning?

The root environment of your installation is severely outdated (<=2.4.0) and suffers from a crippling bug introduced by the conda-3.19.x package.

It is possible to verify the version of Anaconda you have by running:

$ conda info anaconda

The only solution is to update your Anaconda installation to the latest release:

$ source deactivate
$ conda update conda
$ conda update anaconda

Next, update the astroconda environment to realign your packages with the root environment:

$ conda update -n astroconda --all
$ source activate astroconda

After doing this, the mkl 30-day trial warning will not be displayed while importing numpy, scipy, or any other package requiring mkl.

How does AstroConda differ from Ureka?

Ureka and AstroConda both provide applications and libraries in binary form, however Ureka was a one size fits all distribution which included every package in one giant tarball. If an end-user only really wanted a small set of packages they were forced to install everything and then some. AstroConda is a if the shoe fits wear it distribution of packages. If an end-user needs HSTCAL, for example, they can install HSTCAL and omit much of the rest of HST’s software suite.

A major difference most people will appreciate is the sheer lack of shell scripts. Ureka’s environment was controlled by several dozen independent scripts. What makes AstroConda different? For one, it is not controlled by user-executed scripts. Changes to the environment are applied by special (read: embedded) scripts that are executed automatically by source activate, and the environment variables are unset with every source deactivate. This allows you to switch between several different environments rapidly without needing to keep track of what is defined in the environment.

How often are updates released?

Updates to (STScI) software will be released as bugs are identified and squashed. The stsci-* packages, for example, provide “releases” (i.e. a set of software used by our internal pipelines). After installing a release it is then possible to upgrade to the latest out-of-band packages by simply running:

conda update -n astroconda --all

Non-STScI software will be upgraded on an as-needed basis. See the Contibuting Guide to learn more about asking for updates to existing packages.

What happened to SSBX?

SSBX was a weekly release of STScI’s software suite regardless of the stability of the codebase. This release was often times broken and caused issues for external users. SSBX has been rolled into AstroConda as out-of-band package updates. This offers a much better user experience, because as bugs are fixed, people will be able to upgrade without waiting until the following week.

What happened to SSBDEV?

SSBDEV was a nightly snapshot release of STScI’s software suite. This release was often times broken and caused issues for external users. Nightly snapshots are *no longer available* for use by the public. Updates to AstroConda will be made directly as existing software is improved and/or new software is released.

Why isn’t IRAF installed by default?

IRAF is an extremely large software package. Not every developer or scientist requires it.

If you wish to use IRAF, simply install it :

conda create -n iraf27 python=2.7 iraf pyraf stsci && source activate iraf27

If you are already using AstroConda under a Python 2 environment, you may simply install IRAF/PyRAF into that environment:

conda install -n astroconda iraf pyraf

Why is IRAF/PyRAF less functional under Python 3?

The Python code in stsdas, for example, is targeted specifically for Python 2.7 and earlier. If the demand for Python 3.x support under IRAF is great enough we may be able to pull our resources to accommodate the community. It is recommended to install IRAF into its own environment under Python 2.7:

conda create -n iraf27 python=2.7 iraf pyraf stsci && source activate iraf27

Why is IRAF 32-bit instead of 64-bit?

Many of the IRAF tasks that we include with AstroConda are so old that they cannot be compiled as 64-bit executables without significant changes to the source code. Because of this restriction, we always build IRAF as a 32-bit program, even for our 64-bit distributions.

In Linux, how do I install IRAF’s 32-bit dependencies?

Debian >=7, Ubuntu >=14.04

# If on Debian execute this first (not required on Ubuntu):
sudo dpkg --add-architecture i386

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install libc6:i386 libz1:i386 libncurses5:i386 libbz2-1.0:i386 libuuid1:i386 libxcb1:i386

RHEL/CentOS >=6, Fedora >=14

sudo yum install glibc.i686 zlib.i686 ncurses-libs.i686 bzip2-libs.i686 uuid.i686 libxcb.i686

Will AstroConda interfere with other scientific distributions (e.g. SciSoft)?

Probably, however unlike Ureka, we do not impose any restrictions on your environment or issue compatibility warnings at run-time. It is your responsibility to maintain a functional shell environment so [insert scientific distribution here] does not conflict with your Conda installation.

Ds9 - Cannot select regions

The default edit mode is now None rather than Region. To select Region as the default editing mode perform the steps listed here:

  • Click Edit
    • Click Preferences
      • On the left pane, select Menus and Buttons
      • On the right pane, click the Menu -- drop-down menu beneath the Edit group
      • Select Region (default is None)
    • Click the Save button at the bottom of the Preferences dialog box