Software Required to Build GridPACK

CMake/CTest

GridPACK uses the CMake cross-platform build system. A reasonably modern version is required. Currently, version 2.8.8 or newer is required.

CMake projects are designed to be built outside of the source code location. In the top directory of a GridPACK release (GRIDPACK/src) create a subdirectory to use as the location of the build. (In this documentation, GRIDPACK stands for the location of the top level GridPACK directory.) The GRIDPACK/src directory should contain a file called CMakeList.txt. Configure and build GridPACK in the subdirectory.

MPI

A working MPI implementation is required. OpenMPI and MPICH been used successfully. There is no reason to think other implementations would not work. The GridPACK configuration can deal with MPI compiler wrappers (e.g. mpicc), but can also understand other installations.

Identify the compilers and mpiexec to the configuration by including cmake options like:

   -D MPI_CXX_COMPILER:STRING='mpicxx'
   -D MPI_C_COMPILER:STRING='mpicc'
   -D MPIEXEC:STRING='mpiexec'

Other options may be needed to specify the MPI environment. See the documentation here.

Global Arrays

GridPACK depends heavily on "Global Arrays". GridPACK requires the Global Arrays C++ interface be enabled. GridPACK configuration is not able to identify additional required libraries if the Fortran interface is enabled or independent BLAS/LAPACK libraries are used.

To configure GridPACK, specify the directory where Global Arrays is installed and any extra libraries that are required:

   -D GA_DIR:PATH=/path/to/ga/install
   -D GA_EXTRA_LIBS:STRING="..."

The GA_EXTRA_LIBS variable is used to include required libraries not identified in the configuration.

Boost

The Boost C++ Library is used heavily throughout the GridPACK framework, and a relatively recent version is required. The configuration requires version 1.49 or later, but older versions may work. The Boost installation must include Boost::MPI which must have been built with the same MPI compiler used for GridPACK.

To configure GridPACK one need only specify where Boost is installed, like this

   -D BOOST_ROOT:STRING='/path/to/boost'

Boost is tied quite closely to the latest features in C++ and problems can be encountered if the version of Boost that you are using was released much later than the compiler. Reverting to an earlier Boost version can sometimes eliminate problems if you are having difficulties building it. The same is true for Boost and CMake. If the CMake version was released earlier than the Boost version, CMake may have problems identifying the libraries in Boost that it needs for GridPACK. Again, going to an earlier version of Boost may fix these issues.

PETSc

GridPACK currently relies on the Portable, Extensible Toolkit for Scientific Computation (PETSc) for parallel linear algebra, and linear and nonlinear system solvers. PETSc is a complicated package with numerous options. PETSc needs to be built with MPI enabled and using the same MPI implementation used for GridPACK. It also needs to use C++ as the base language. Originally, GridPACK could only use PETSc if it was configured for complex support. The current GridPACK release can use either complex or real builds. However, most applications in GridPACK use complex matrices, so it is still preferable to configure PETSc to use complex variables. Refer to the PETSc installation documentation for additional information on how configuring PETSc.

Configuring and building PETSc is done in the top level PETSc directory. One of the configuration variables that needs to be set when configuring and building PETSc is PETSC_ARCH. In the example below, PETSC_ARCH was set to 'arch-Darwin-cxx-opt'. After the build is complete, there will be a directory beneath the top level directory with whatever name was assigned to PETSC_ARCH. This directory contains the include and lib directories for the PETSc libraries.

The GridPACK configuration must know where PETSc is installed. This is specified by two options as shown below.

   -D PETSC_DIR:STRING='/Users/d3g096/ProjectStuff/petsc-3.4.0'
   -D PETSC_ARCH:STRING='arch-darwin-cxx-opt'

Currently, the configuration will recognize and adjust the GridPACK build if the PETSc build includes ParMETIS and/or Superlu_DIST.

ParMETIS

GridPACK uses ParMETIS to (re)distribute an electrical network over several processors. It needs to be built with the same MPI configuration as Boost and PETSc. GridPACK configuration will find ParMETIS automatically if it has been included in the PETSc build. Otherwise, the GridPACK configuration just needs to know where ParMETIS was installed, which is specified by

   -D PARMETIS_DIR:STRING="/pic/projects/gridpack/software"

GridPACK requires version ParMETIS version 4.0. Older versions will not work.

Doxygen

GridPACK uses Doxygen to help document code. It's use is optional. Doxygen documentation can optionally be prepared during the build process. This is enabled if Doxygen is found. Graphviz is necessary for full documentation features.