In this case, this is ok, since localhost is just the name of your own computer and you are using the SSH tunnel you yourself have set up.JGRASP is a lightweight development environment, created specifically to provide automatic generation of software visualizations to improve the comprehensibility of software. Your browser will give you security warnings about this, because it will recognize that you are trying to connect to cs. but have in fact connected to localhost. Once you have done this, you can access Autolab by visiting in a browser. This establishes what is called an SSH tunnel that routes traffic through your computer to our Autolab server through a connection to stu.cs.jmu.edu, which is the student server for computer science students.
Ssh -L 4443:autolab.cs.jmu.edu:443 log in using your EID password. To do this simply run the following command in your shell but make sure to replace “your-username” with your actual username: This sounds really complicated and fancy, but is actually fairly straightforward.
In order to access Autolab from off campus you must either install and run the VPN or you must create an SSH tunnel through the shell. Guides on using Autolab can be found here.ĭirect access to Autolab is blocked from off campus for security reasons. If you are on campus, or on the campus network, you simply go to and log in with your EID. You should also be able to find it quickly by typing “Terminal” into spotlight.Īutolab is the software you will use to submit your code for programming assignments in CS 149. This is stored in the /Applications/Utilities/ folder.
If you are on the Mac, the shell can be used from within the Terminal app.
If you simply type “powershell” into the search bar on the start menu the Windows PowerShell app should be the Best Match. If you are on Windows, there are actually two that come pre-installed, but the one you should use is called the “Windows PowerShell”. The good news is that you don't need to do anything to install a shell.
You may be surprised to learn that even now programmers use the shell! This is because text based control of the computer is often more convenient and more powerful (once you have learned how to use it), especially for lots of programming related tasks. It's the old school text-based way of interacting with software on the computer.
If you've ever seen an old hacker movie from the '80s and seen the hacker hacking away at a black screen with green text, that's the shell. The second thing you will need is access to a shell. If you are on a Mac, you will have the jGRASP app installed to your /Applications/ folder, which you can access from the Finder. If you are on Windows you should now have a “jGRASP” shortcut on your desktop. Once the installer has completed downloading, run the installer and keep clicking “Next” until you are presented with a “Finish” button. This will start the download for the proper installer. If you are on a Mac, select the “pkg” button. If you are using Windows, select the “exe” button. There are three green buttons below this, “jGRASP Bundled exe”, “jGRASP Bundled pkg”, and “jGRASP Bundled zip”. To download the jGRASP installer, navigate to, click the “Download” link on the left-hand menu, and scroll down until you see the gray box that begins with “jGRASP” followed by the version with the words “Bundled with OpenJDK” below it. So that you do not also need to separately install a Java installation, we recommend you install the version of jGRASP that comes bundled with OpenJDK, which is the open source version of the Java development kit, as well as the Checkstyle and JUnit tools. Bowers does it in this YouTube playlist). JGRASP is very easy to download, install, and set-up (see how quickly Dr. IDE stands for integrated development environment and is just a fancy term for a code editor (with a few extra bells and whistles). All sections of CS 149 in fall 2021 are using the jGRASP IDE. Think of this as Microsoft Word for Java code. The first thing you need for CS 149 is a Java code editor.