Configuration of Mac OS X for Faculty and Students in Biostatistics

This page is to enable faculty and students in the Department of Biostatistics @ JHSPH to set up a Mac OS X 10.4. (Tiger) configuration for a convenient and efficient scientific computing environment. If you have suggestions for improvements or catch an error, please send an email to Ingo.


[ Things we still need to discuss | Tips and Tricks | Mac OS X Notes from Karl | Mac OS X Notes from Fernando | Mac OS X Notes from Snaebjorn ]


[ Basic Installations for Tiger | Basic Installations for both Tiger and Panther | Mac OS X Software Installs via Fink | Dot Files from Giovanni | Statistical Stuff | Free Mac Software | Purchased Packages ]


Basic Installations for Tiger:

X11 Developer tools

On the installation DVD (1), go to Xcode Tools → Xcodetools.mpkg
You also might want to install the X11SDK package: Xcode Tools → Packages → X11SDK.pkg on the installation DVD.

X11

On the installation DVD (scroll down in the Finder window!) click on Optional Installs , follow the lead, and select X11 under Applications when you get to the Installation Type in the installation process. If you want to drag it to your Dock, you'll find the X11 icon in Applications → Utilities . In any case, is very convenient to have the Terminal on your dock - you also find it in Applications → Utilities (or even better, use iTerm - see below under free stuff).

LaTeX


Purchased Packages:

See Jiong for Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat Professional.


Free Mac Software:

Firefox, iTerm, Browser plugin for pdfs


and select through the [ Xcode Tools → Xcodetools.mpkg ] In [ Applications : Utilities ] click on X11.app


Basic Installations for Panther:

X11 Developer tools In [ Applications : Installers : Xcode Tools ] click on Developers.mpkg

X11 Developer tools SDK In [ Applications : Installers : Xcode Tools : Packages ]

Note: You can also find those by using the search bar in the Finder.

Apple's X11 http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/x11/download/. http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/x11/


Basic Installations for both Tiger and Panther:

Fink binary installer (version 0.8. as of September 18 2005). http://fink.sourceforge.net/download/index.php?phpLang=en.
We ignored a warning message.

Fink commander http://finkcommander.sourceforge.net/
We ignored warning messages! Drag the FinkCommander into the Applications folder.

Norton anti-virus http://www.jhu.edu/anti-virus/


Mac OS X Software Installs via Fink:

[ Packages in bold face we think you really need, the others are recommended ]

aspell

auctex

detex

dict

emacs21

foiltex

gimp

gv (we picked ghostscript, ghostscript-font)

imagemagick

ispell

latex2html

latex2rtf

mysql

pdfscreen

pdfslide

psutils

spell

tcltk

tetex

xdvi

xfig


Dot Files from Giovanni:

[ Download from ~gp/mac.files ]

.emacs

.profile

.bashrc

.alias


Statistical Stuff:

R http://cran.r-project.org/
Check out the Mac FAQ page http://cran.r-project.org/bin/macosx/RAqua-FAQ.html

Note: The install.packages option may not work from the command line unless you install tcltk version 8.4. This may go away with Tiger. Click here to learn more.

ESS http://stat.ethz.ch/ESS/Manual/readme.html.
Place in /sw/share/emacs/site-lisp


Free Mac Software:

Firefox http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/

LatexIT http://www.apple.com/downloads/macosx/math_science/latexit.html

Jabref http://jabref.sourceforge.net/

Browser plugin http://www.schubert-it.com/pluginpdf/

Quicksilver http://quicksilver.blacktree.com/ Launch applications without using the mouse.


Purchased Packages:

Microsoft Office [ departmental license ]

Acrobat Reader [ upgrade ]

BBEdit Lite (ver 6.1.2) for OS X

Upgrade Stuffit expander standard [ also bought license for DropStuff ]

Palm desktop 4.0