The CIRA Nereus-V Server is no longer running
Nereus-V is a distributed computing system developed by Oxford. CIRA contributes CPU cycles to astrophysics-related applications that run on this system. We have a local server that any internal or external user can connect to in order to donate time on their desktop computer, so please consider offering up a core on your machine if (like many) it spends the majority of its time under low load.
The Nereus-V system uses Java and can be run directly from a web page, although it can also be run in stand-alone mode if you prefer. The client requires Sun Java version 1.6; please check the installation instructions below to make sure that your system is capable of running the client.
Nereus-V uses an insignificant amount of disk space but it does occupy about 500 MB of RAM and one CPU core in the default mode of operation.
Navigate to http://nereus.cira.curtin.edu.au and click on the large central link to download the processing client. If you are using Firefox under Linux, you will probably be asked to run the file using Java Web Start or save it to disk. Make sure you run it. Another browser window will open up, displaying a thank you message. You can close both the nereus browser windows and your machine will continue to download packets and process data in the background until you kill the java process or reboot.
If you would prefer to watch what the Nereus-V client is doing and retain the ability to kill it by closing your browser window, select the smaller “Open Nereus Applet” link from the CIRA server page. This will embed the applet in the browser window, providing a small graphical user interface. Because the applet is bound to the web site in this mode, it will exit if you close the page.
If you would like to close your web browser and still be able to view the Nereus client GUI, you can click the lower right hand link on the Nereus Server homepage “Open Nereus Web Start” and this will launch the JWS application with a GUI.
By default, the applet GUI displays some basic information about the processing task that it is performing. You can see a more detailed diagnostic display by right-clicking on the GUI area and selecting the “Console for 'SKADataProcessor'” option.
If you would like to run the client from a terminal, run the following command:
javaws -Xnosplash http://nereus.cira.curtin.edu.au/nereus/Nereus.jnlp &
The client will display the GUI as an independent window that can be minimised if it gets in the way. When running in this mode, you can stop the client by closing its GUI window.
In order to prepare your machine for the Nereus-V client, please run the following commands:
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install sun-java6-jre sun-java6-bin sun-java6-plugin
sudo update-java-alternatives -s java-6-sun
You should probably restart your web browser after doing this.