Software

You need to have the following software running for working on the exercises for Programming Distributed Systems:

Git [version management]
Erlang [programming language]
Rebar3 [build tool for Erlang]

We further recommend to install Visual Studio Code and the extensions „erlang“ and „Erlang/OTP"

Installing Git and Erlang

Most linux or unix-like distributions can get Git and Erlang from package managers. For OSX we recommend using Homebrew.

Installing Rebar

Download the binary from here and copy to a directory in your $PATH. Ensure it is executable (chmod +x).

Hint: It is common to create a directory ~/bin/ to place commands like rebar3 and add it to your path with export PATH=~/bin/:$PATH in your ~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc or equivalent.

Alternatively, you can install Rebar from source:

Open a command line. Create a directory for downloading and building rebar3. Go to the directory and run the following commands:

$ git clone https://github.com/erlang/rebar3.git
$ cd rebar3
$ ./bootstrap

Installing Git on Windows:

Download the binary installer from here https://git-scm.com

Installing Erlang on Windows:

Download the binary version of Erlang 20.3 from here: http://www.erlang.org/download.html [most probably you want the OTP 20.3 Windows 64-bit Binary File ]
Double-click to start the installer
Go to directory C:\Program Files\erl9.3\bin
To check that the installation worked, run werl.exe [It should open an Erlang shell]
Add C:\Program Files\erl9.3\bin to your Path On Windows 10, it works like that:
- Open “Settings”
- Search for “View advanced system settings”
- Button “Environment Variables”
- Choose “Path” from “User variables for….” and click on button “Edit…”
- Add C:\Program Files\erl9.3\bin to the list
Now, open a command prompt and enter erl
Done! [hit Ctrl-C to exit the erlang shell]