General Installation Notes

To run the application, you'll need: gtk+, Python, Cairo/PyCairo, and PyGTK. For Linux users, these are probably already installed, and if not, they're certainly available in your distribution's repository. Use your distro's package manager to install these, if they're not already. Windows users can use the links below to install the necessary components. OS X users are on their own for now, I'm afraid, but I'm pretty sure that packages do exist for that platform.

There's no installers for any platform. Currently the app is meant to be basically just run from wherever you unzipped or untarred it. On Windows this would mean double-clicking on uqm-map.py, or creating a shortcut to the same. On Linux you'd probably just run them from the commandline, set up a symlink somewhere, or create a shortcut in your desktop environment of choice.

Windows Specifics

I haven't done any extensive testing on Windows, but it does run. Here are more direct links to the pieces of software you'll need to install before running the map viewer:

  • gtk+ Runtime
    There are a number of gtk+ runtimes available on the internet. The one linked here is from the gladewin32 project, and is the main gtk+ runtime officially endorsed by PyGTK. It includes Cairo, so a separate Cairo installation is not required. You can get the program working with other gtk+ runtime packages as well, but it involves more work. If you DO have other gtk+ runtimes installed, certainly be careful about installing this one side-by-side. You probably only want one active at any given time.

  • Python
    I've tested the app on Python 2.5 and 2.6. You may as well just get 2.6.

  • PyGTK
    Be sure to install all three of PyCairo, PyGObject, and PyGTK. You need all three, otherwise it won't work. Be sure to grab the "py2.6" versions if you installed Python 2.6 as recommended. If you're on Python 2.5, there should be links there as well.

Once those dependencies are installed, you should be able to just double-click on uqm-map.py (from wherever you unzipped the archive), and it'll start right up.

Linux Specifics

What I'd recommend is just leaving it untarred wherever you untarred it, and make a symlink to uqm-map.py into somewhere in your $PATH (~/bin is probably the best location). For example:

$ cd ~/bin
$ ln -s /path/to/uqm-map.py .

At that point you should be able to just run "uqm-map.py" from the command prompt, for instance. Setting up shortcuts through your window manager of choice should work fine, as well. Failing that, just run them from the directory you untarred them into.

OS X Specifics

Apparently, getting all the prerequisites installed on OSX (specifically the PyGTK/PyCairo stuff) is somewhat non-trivial, and may be pretty frustrating for folks who aren't used to digging into UNIXy software installation practices. Since I don't have access to that platform, I can't really help too much. If anyone does figure it out, please drop me a line so I can provide some better docs.