getting started
Modern quantum chemistry research is built on high-performance computing. In most cases, we run quantum chemistry softwares on multi-core machines with hundreds of gigabytes of memory.
These machines typically run a Linux operating system (e.g., Ubuntu or Rocky Linux). We access them remotely via SSH and work primarily in a terminal environment. Therefore, familiarity with Linux and command-line tools is an essential skill for every quantum chemist.
Below are excellent resources to help you get started:
At a minimum, you should be comfortable with:
- Unix shell (file system navigation, scripting, job control)
- Vim or another terminal-based text editor
- Git for version control
- Python and Numpy for scientific programming
Developing these skills early will make your research significantly more efficient and enjoyable.
If you are currently a Windows user, you are strongly encouraged to use Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL) so that you can work in a Linux environment locally.
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