[Numpy-discussion] building NumPy with Intel CC & MKL

[rex]

David Cournapeau <david at ar.media.kyoto-u.ac.jp> [2007-01-23 23:40]:
> rex wrote:
> > Robert Kern <robert.kern at gmail.com> [2007-01-23 22:18]:
> >> You need to install the development package for Python. Usually it's named
> >> something like python2.5-devel.
> >
> > Thank you. Did that, and NumPy compiled with a Brazillion warnings, but
> > no errors. 
> >
> > Then I did:
> > export LD_RUN_PATH=/opt/lib:/opt/intel/cc/9.1.042/lib:/opt/intel/mkl/8.1/lib/32
> > (because I used the Intel defaults, and those are the correct paths)
> >
> > But since the SUSE NumPy rpm is also installed, how do I determine
> > which version is loaded when the command:
> > from numpy import *
> > is issued in python? Subjectively, it appears the new version is not
> > being used. I expect a significant speed difference using the Intel
> > compiler and MKL on a Core 2 Duo.
> >
> > Why is this so difficult?
> >
> It is somewhat difficult to do something somewhat complicated :) In your 
> case, one solution to set the dir where numpy is installed is to use the 
> env variable PYTHONPATH.

But installing software is typically easy for Windows users. IMO, the
difficulty of installing Linux applications is a huge barrier to wider
adoption of Linux. I started trying Linux in 1994, and stopped using
Windows entirely in 1999. I'm old (66), and becoming dumber as my brain
shrinks, but I'm still reasonably sharp (or so I like to think). Over
the years, NumPy and SciPy have been very difficult to install for me
using SUSE (the SUSE developers have different ideas of what paths
should be from most of the rest of the world. If I were King I'd lock
'em all in a room and tell them that if they could not agree on a
directory structure for Linux in 48 hours, they would all be
killed. Impending death tends to focus attention on the problem.)

Two of my two closest friends have advanced degrees. One is a PhD in
orbital mechanics from UCSD, and the other did everything for a PhD in
computer science but complete his thesis. Both have tried Linux
repeatedly, but found it to require more effort to install and maintain
than they are willing to expend. If people of this caliber are repelled
by Linux, I think developers need to wake up and smell the coffee. When
people with PhDs in science are turned off by the difficulty the problem
needs to be addressed.
 
> To check which numpy you use, you can simply do a import numpy; print 
> numpy, which should print the full path,

>>> import numpy
>>> print numpy
<module 'numpy' from '/usr/lib/python2.5/site-packages/numpy/__init__.pyc'>

What am I to make of this? Is it the rpm numpy or is it the numpy I
built using the Intel compiler and MKL?

Thanks for the reply, but I'm still confused.

-rex
-- 
"When asked, as I frequently am, why I should concern myself so deeply
with the conservation of animal life, I reply that I have been very
lucky and that throughout my life the world has given me the most
enormous pleasure. But the world is as delicate and as complicated as a
spider's web. If you touch one thread you send shudders running through
all the other threads. We are not just touching the web we are tearing
great holes in it." Gerald Durrell 1925-1995.