[Swarm-Modelling] New version of Ecolab

[Russell Standish]

I'm pleased to announce the availability of EcoLab 4.D14, an agent
based modeling environment built on C++, with features similar to Swarm. 


This is a substantial upgrade to functionality, incorporating
Graphcode technology, which allows programmer to distribute agents
across an arbitray topology graph - Graphcode will handle distribution
of the nodes (and agents) of the graph across multiple processors,
handling communication via the MPI trasport layer. It makes extensive
use of Classdesc reflection to handle the migration of agents between
processors. EcoLab also makes use of Classdesc to expose the structure
of your model to a TCL scripting environment, allowing drilldown
capability on your agents similar to Swarms probes, and adding GUI
style widgets for interactive exploration of your model.

The EcoLab comes with serveral example models, including the spatial
Ecolab model (spatial cells are distributed across a 2D von Neumann
grid), and a model of Palauan jellyfish - the jellyfish have a continuous
position, but are aggregated in cells distributed on a 2D von Neumann
lattice to enable simple tracking of neighbouring jellyfish. A further
example is an implementation of Quince and McKane's Webworld model.

EcoLab has been built and tested on the following platform and compilers:

   Linux/gcc
   Linux/icc
   Windows/Cygwin
   MacOS X/gcc
   Irix/gcc
   Irix/MIPS Pro
   Tru 64/cxx

It is expected that EcoLab can be made to work with any Posix
compliant platform with TCL/Tk available, with any standard C++
compiler.

Both the Classdesc and Graphcode technologies are also released as separate
products, at versions Classdesc.1.D12 and Graphcode.1.D2

The source code of all these packages is available directly from the
code repository at http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/getaegisdist.cgi

                                                Cheers

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A/Prof Russell Standish                  Director
High Performance Computing Support Unit, Phone 9385 6967, 8308 3119 (mobile)
UNSW SYDNEY 2052                         Fax   9385 6965, 0425 253119 (")
Australia                                address@hidden             
Room 2075, Red Centre                    http://parallel.hpc.unsw.edu.au/rks
            International prefix  +612, Interstate prefix 02
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