Key elements of the user-friendly, GFDL SKYHI general circulation model

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Richard S. Hemler,

Affiliations: Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory/NOAA, P.O. Box 308, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ 08542, USA. Tel.: +1 609 452 6598; Fax: +1 609 987 5063; E-mail: rsh@gfdl.gov

Abstract: Over the past seven years, the portability of the GFDL SKYHI general circulation model has greatly increased. Modifications to the source code have allowed SKYHI to be run on the GFDL Cray Research PVP machines, the TMC CM-5 machine at Los Alamos National Laboratory, and more recently on the GFDL 40-processor Cray Research T3E system. At the same time, changes have been made to the model to make it more usable and flexible. Because of the reduction of the human resources available to manage and analyze scientific experiments, it is no longer acceptable to consider only the optimization of computer resources when producing a research code; one must also consider the availability and cost of the people necessary to maintain, modify and use the model as an investigative tool, and include these factors in defining the form of the model code. The new SKYHI model attempts to strike a balance between the optimization of the use of machine resources (CPU time, memory, disc) and the optimal use of human resources (ability to understand code, ability to modify code, ability to perturb code to do experiments, ability to run code on different platforms). Two of the key features that make the new SKYHI code more usable and flexible are the archiving package and the user variable block. The archiving package is used to manage the writing of all archive files, which contain data for later analysis. The model-supplied user variable block allows the easy inclusion of any new variables needed for particular experiments.

Journal: Scientific Programming, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 39-47, 2000