One of my greatest challenges so far has been to get the Universal Robotics simulator up and running. Not using it, but just installing it. Having never used Linux before it was a challenge to even set it up, when used to automatic Windows installs. However an excellent PDF showing screenshots of the install can be found at the folllowing link and was a distinct improvement on the older instructions.
 https://academy.universal-robots.com/media/jiehhszc/ursim_vmoracle_installation_guidev03_en.pdf 

The trouble was due to my not having extracted the rar file (similar to zip but doesn't look like it, thus the confusion). Once this was done, it was pretty easy.

Now I need to learn to use it!

It was with great joy that our first hydroponic kits arrived yesterday. My daughter and I built them together and it was great to see how easy these were to build. I had my reservations about using kits, feeling that I should go for commercial custom made racks, but I can see how these are attractive for their ease of use. I will be able to concentrate on whether the lighting adapter is working, rather than fixing my garden! As you can see, I made building a family affair and much fun was had by all.

After so long stuck at a desk going through literature reviews, reading articles on vertical farming, interviewing agritechnology experts and brainstorming, the time is finally here to put the foot to the accelerator and get going with the practical part of our research.

The aim is to build a small indoor farm inside an insulated shipping container, using LED grow lights, temperature control and our special adapter on one of the growing racks. We'll be measuring growth, and wellbeing of the plants. Ideally all the nutrient feeds will be automatic but this will depend on how much money we can raise.