Running EMC in Windows

Yunes_Salman · March 22, 2025, 2:38pm

Hi Pieter,

I have downloaded the latest EMC version emc_win32_v9.4.4_20240801.tgz

To get the GUI to work in VMD I have edited vmd.rc in Program Files\VMD by adding the following lines:

set auto_path [linsert $auto_path 0 “C:/Users/ymms_/Downloads/emc/v9.4.4/vmd”]

source “C:/Users/ymms_/Downloads/emc/v9.4.4/vmd/packages/gui.tcl”

set script_path “C:/Users/ymms_/Downloads/emc/v9.4.4/scripts”

I edited added gui.tcl in emc\v9.4.4\vmd\packages

By adding set ::EMC::gui::EMC_ROOTDIR “C:/Users/ymms_/Downloads/emc/v9.4.4” under variable EMC_ROOTDIR

Now the GUI opens, however, it is missing all the tabs after force feilds as shown in the attached screenshot.

Also I get this error in vmd

vmd >
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) WELCOME TO THE EMC SETUP GUI
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) EMC GUI developed by
Info) Marc Siggel, Eduard Schreiner, and Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info) Version 1.5.3, 23 July 2022
Info)
Info) EMC developed by
Info) Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info)
Info) Please include this reference in published work using EMC:
Info) P.J. in 't Veld and G.C.Rutledge, Macromolecules 2003, 36, 7358
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
ERROR) Creation of window for ‘emc_gui’ failed (key “charmm” not known in dictionary).

Am I doing something wrong?

Thank you for your time.

Best regards,
Yunes Salman

Yunes_Salman · March 22, 2025, 2:55pm

Hi Pieter,

Sorry, I found your instructions here How to setup EMC for Windows and undid everything I mentioned above.

Now I get this error:

vmd >
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) WELCOME TO THE EMC SETUP GUI
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) EMC GUI developed by
Info) Marc Siggel, Eduard Schreiner, and Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info) Version 1.5.3, 23 July 2022
Info)
Info) EMC developed by
Info) Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info)
Info) Please include this reference in published work using EMC:
Info) P.J. in 't Veld and G.C.Rutledge, Macromolecules 2003, 36, 7358
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
ERROR) Creation of window for ‘emc_gui’ failed (wrong # args: should be “dict exists dictionary key ?key …?”).

kgk · March 22, 2025, 4:21pm

Hello,
check this thread, which is highly relevant to your case: VMD plugin: ERROR) Creation of window for ‘emc_gui’ failed: Windows 10 install
I used to have the same problem (gui opened with missing tabs) and I solved it by installing emc in:
C:\emc\v9.4.4
Any other directory structure was giving errors.

Yunes_Salman · March 22, 2025, 4:26pm

Hello,

Thank you very much! Yes, that worked like a charmm

Best regards,
Yunes Salman

veld · March 22, 2025, 11:28pm

Dear users,

Thank you for reporting the issue and it’s apparent solution. I wasn’t aware that the VMD GUI apparently expects EMC to be in a certain spot. I’ll have to look into what exactly is causing this behavior.

Yunes_Salman · March 23, 2025, 9:46am

Hi Pieter,

Thank you for looking into it.

After I did all what Kyriakos suggested and adding HOST etc.

Everything opens normally however when I test run build I get the following error.

Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/setup.esh’
Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/test/tmp/setup/setup.esh’
Error) EMC Setup failure: EMC Setup v4.1.5 (March 30, 2024), (c) 2004-2024 Pieter J. in 't Veld

Info: reading script from “./setup\setup.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “stages/setup/00.esh”
The fchmod function is unimplemented at C:\emc\v9.4.4/scripts/emc_setup.pl line 10556.
Info) Keeping ‘/B:/test/test/tmp’

I then comment out line 10556 and 10067 in C:\emc\v9.4.4/scripts/emc_setup.pl

I get this error:

vmd >
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) WELCOME TO THE EMC SETUP GUI
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) EMC GUI developed by
Info) Marc Siggel, Eduard Schreiner, and Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info) Version 1.5.3, 23 July 2022
Info)
Info) EMC developed by
Info) Pieter J. in 't Veld
Info)
Info) Please include this reference in published work using EMC:
Info) P.J. in 't Veld and G.C.Rutledge, Macromolecules 2003, 36, 7358
Info) -------------------------------------------------------------------------
Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/setup.esh’
Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/test/tmp/setup/setup.esh’
Error) EMC Setup failure: EMC Setup v4.1.5 (March 30, 2024), (c) 2004-2024 Pieter J. in 't Veld

Info: reading script from “./setup\setup.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “stages/setup/00.esh”
The fchmod function is unimplemented at C:\emc\v9.4.4/scripts/emc_setup.pl line 10556.
Info) Keeping ‘/B:/test/test/tmp’
Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/test/tmp/setup/setup.esh’
Error) EMC Setup failure: EMC Setup v4.1.5 (March 30, 2024), (c) 2004-2024 Pieter J. in 't Veld

Info: reading script from “./setup\setup.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “stages/setup/00.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “clusters/00/00.dat”
Info: creating job create chemistry script “scripts/setup.sh”
The fchmod function is unimplemented at C:\emc\v9.4.4/scripts/emc_setup.pl line 10067.
Info) Keeping ‘/B:/test/test/tmp’
Info) Writing EMC Script to ‘B:/test/test/tmp/setup/setup.esh’
Error) EMC Setup failure: EMC Setup v4.1.5 (March 30, 2024), (c) 2004-2024 Pieter J. in 't Veld

Info: reading script from “./setup\setup.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “stages/setup/00.esh”
Info: creating chemistry “clusters/00/00.dat”
Info: creating job create chemistry script “scripts/setup.sh”
Info: creating job analyze script “setup\setup.sh”
Error: cannot open “setup\setup.sh”

child killed: unknown signal
Info) Keeping ‘/B:/test/test/tmp’

I will run EMC in an ubuntu virtual machine for now.

Thank you for the support.

Best regards,
Yunes Salman