Installing Singularity Locally

If you really only want to install Singularity instead of Apptainer, you need to find an older version of Singularity and compile it from source. Here are the general steps for installing Singularity 3.x on an Ubuntu system:

First, open a terminal and install the necessary dependencies:

sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install -y \
    build-essential \
    libssl-dev \
    uuid-dev \
    libgpgme11-dev \
    squashfs-tools \
    libseccomp-dev \
    pkg-config \
    git \
    cryptsetup-bin

Install the Go language environment:

export VERSION=1.13 OS=linux ARCH=amd64  # Replace with the desired Go version
wget https://dl.google.com/go/go$VERSION.$OS-$ARCH.tar.gz
sudo tar -C /usr/local -xzvf go$VERSION.$OS-$ARCH.tar.gz
rm go$VERSION.$OS-$ARCH.tar.gz
echo 'export GOPATH=${HOME}/go' >> ~/.bashrc
echo 'export PATH=/usr/local/go/bin:${PATH}:${GOPATH}/bin' >> ~/.bashrc
source ~/.bashrc

Confirm that Go is installed successfully:

go version

Next, download the Singularity source code (make sure you download Singularity, not Apptainer):

export VERSION=3.8.7
wget https://github.com/apptainer/singularity/releases/download/v3.8.7/singularity-3.8.7.tar.gz
tar -xzf singularity-3.8.7.tar.gz
cd singularity-3.8.7

Compile and install Singularity:

./mconfig && \
    make -C builddir && \
    sudo make -C builddir install

After installation, check the Singularity version:

singularity version

Please note that the version numbers included in the above steps (such as the Go version and Singularity version) may change over time, so it is recommended to check the official documentation or GitHub repository for the latest version information.

Since the Singularity project has been renamed to Apptainer, it may be difficult to find support and documentation for older versions. If you don't need specific older features of Singularity, it is recommended to use Apptainer, as it is the current official version with the latest features and security fixes.