SnapGene Server is no longer available for purchase or use by commercial third parties. This guide is provided for existing SnapGene Server users.
What is SnapGene Server
SnapGene Server is an application you can install on a web server in order to generate interactive or static DNA maps on your website. In addition to generating maps, you can also do the following:
- Convert any format supported by SnapGene to the .dna file format
- Convert .dna files to FASTA or GenBank format
- Annotate a sequence by detecting common features
- Annotate primer binding sites by importing primers from a list
- Export a feature summary
- Export a primer summary
See https://www.snapgene.com/snapgene-server for an overview.
Install SnapGene Server
Visit https://www.snapgene.com/my-account/ and login to download the appropriate package for your Linux distribution. At this time SnapGene Server supports Fedora Linux 23+ and Ubuntu Linux 14+.
To install on deb based distributions (e.g. Ubuntu):
sudo dpkg -i /path/to/snapgene-server.deb
cd /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/install
sudo ./install_ubuntu
To install on rpm based distributions (e.g. Fedora):
sudo dnf install /path/to/snapgene_server.rpm
cd /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/install
sudo ./install_fedora
Add PHP ZMQ Support
It is necessary to add PHP ZMQ support to Apache to be able to communicate over ZMQ between a PHP powered web page and the SnapGene Server daemon.
To install on deb based distributions (e.g. Ubuntu):
apt-get install -y python-zmq
pecl install zmq-beta
To install on rpm based distributions (e.g. Fedora):
dnf install zeromq-devel
pecl install zmq-beta
Next, edit /etc/php.ini and add
extension=zmq.so
Finally restart Apache so that the ZMQ extension is loaded.
apachectl restart
The extension should have been installed under: /usr/lib64/php/modules.
You can verify that ZMQ support has been loaded by calling “phpinfo()” from any .php code.
Activate SnapGene Server
Before SnapGene Server can run it needs a license installed. Request and install a license like so:
sudo /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/tools/license-utility.py -t requestLicense -n "GROUP NAME" -c "REGISTRATION CODE"
If things work as expected, your license file should be installed under:
/etc/snapgene-server/.klf
Alternatively, you can check the license status like so:
sudo /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/tools/license-utility.py -t info
Start SnapGene Server
sudo /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/tools/start
Finally, verify that SnapGene Server is running:
/opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/tools/info.py
If desired, you can stop SnapGene Server like so:
sudo /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/tools/stop
Adding start to your distributions startup script to ensure the daemon is started automatically is left as an exercise to the reader.
Additional Reading
See /opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/example.php for an example of how to dynamically generate map content from a web page.
To learn how to take advantage of the full set of functionality, read the full manual installed under:
/opt/gslbiotech/snapgene-server/SERVER_MANUAL.txt