Using HARK in graphical environments or working around it

[llorracc]

Just tried to install on an AWS EC2 instance, and on trying to use it got the error "HARK must be used in a graphical environment."

In fact, there are a number of ways in which someone might want to use Econ-ARK/HARK tools without a graphical front end. Most notably, someone might want to offload some compute-intensive stuff to AWS or another platform, let it run and generate results, and then collect those results. This could even include figures; matplotlib can be used without a graphical environment (the figures do not render but can be saved).

A test case would be to run any of the do_min.py files in the REMARK repo. These should be executable from within the appropriate directory just by the command-line command ipython do_min.py -- which has been tested and found to work on full-blown systems. (A good choice might be BufferStockTheory/do_min.py).

However, it would also be useful to know how someone who DOES want to use interactive graphical tools in HARK could set up a VM that would satisfy whatever are the 'graphical environment' requirements. (I found that installing the full-blown Ubuntu/Xubuntu desktop was sufficient, but unclear if necessary -- and it took a while to figure out how to do that).

[MridulS]

I can look into this.

[llorracc]

Great -- the goal is basically to make it easy for people not very familiar with AWS or Google Compute Platform to spin up a VM that can be used with all the graphical tools of HARK. A script or how-to is what is needed.

[sbenthall]

Can this issue be closed?

[MridulS]

Yeah, all good now.