Installation

The MDI Desktop is a cross-platform Electron app. The MDI Apps Framework that it launches is an R Shiny web interface used to perform data analysis.

Install the MDI Desktop

Please download the relevant installer for your local operating system:

You may be prompted to confirm the download, installation, or use of the MDI Desktop. Please read the security notes to understand the risks and benefits of using the Desktop, including the measures we take to protect your computer.

Please note that MDI apps, including the Desktop, are cross-platform web tools that are not intended to look or feel like a native app on your operating system.

The Desktop features an auto-update process, so once installed you should always have the most recent code.

Install R

The only other software required to use the Desktop is R itself (the app will help you install R Shiny and other required packages).

If you are working in a remote server mode, your server probably already has R available, perhaps by calling “module load R/#.#.#” as on UM Great Lakes. Please see your server’s documentation for details.

If you are working in local mode, you need to install R on your desktop or laptop computer via the link below (note that R Studio is not required):

https://cran.r-project.org/

Install XQuartz on MacOS

For Mac computers running the MDI in local mode, you will likely need to make X11 available on your system for R plots to appear correctly. Obtain it by installing XQuartz:

https://www.xquartz.org/

XQuartz is needed because X11 is no longer included by default since Mac OS X 10.8. Without it, at least some app plots and images will fail to render as expected.