Release Notes for the Current Development Version

These release notes are for the current development version of Opus/UrbanSim, which will be released as Version 4.2.0 when it is more stable. These notes cover changes since 12 November 2007.

20 April 2008

Updated versions of Python and various packages are now needed:

• Python 2.5 or greater (Python 2.5.1 recommended)
• matplotlib 0.91.2
• numpy 1.0.4
• PyQt 4.3.3
• scipy 0.6.0
• SQLAlchemy 0.4.5

Later stable releases of these packages will probably work as well.

A test project for the parcel version of UrbanSim is now available (for Seattle for the base year 2000), in addition to Eugene data for the gridcell version.

The GUI uses xml configuration files that specify the model configuration, where the data is located, and so forth. These project files expect a particular directory layout for the configurations themselves, the data, and so forth. The base directory for an opus installation (called opus by default) should contain the following subdirectories and files:

opus
    src
        opus_core
        urbansim
        (all the other Python packages)
    docs
        installation
        opus_userguide.pdf
        opus_userguide
            (files for the html version of userguide go here)
        tutorials
    project_configs
        eugene_gridcell.xml
        seattle_parcel.xml
        (other personal xml project configurations go here)
    gui
        gui_config.xml
    data
        eugene_gridcell
            baseyear_cache
                1980
                    (baseyear cache files here)
            runs
                (the system will put directories for run results here)
        seattle_parcel
            baseyear_cache
                2000
                    (baseyear cache files here)
            runs
                (the system will put directories for run results here)

A zip file containing this entire directory structure for the 4.2-dev development version, including the Eugene and Seattle data, is available at http://www.urbansim.org/opus/releases/opus-4-2-dev/opus-4-2-dev.zip

You can unzip this to a convenient location on your local disk (say your home directory). The environment variable OPUS_HOME should point to the location of the opus directory. You can optionally have an environment variable OPUS_DATA_PATH that points to the data directory; if this variable is missing it defaults to OPUS_HOME plus data. The gui subdirectory contains configuration information for the GUI itself; you shouldn't need to do anything with this. The src directory is empty in the development version -- populate this from the subversion repository. (Or you can keep your source code in a different directory; it doesn't need to be at this location. Make sure your PYTHONPATH variable is correctly set to point to the source code directory, wherever you put it.) Finally, in the development version of the zip file, docs is also empty -- you can find the latest documentation on the UrbanSim download page. Documentation for the exact version that you have checked out from subversion is in the project opus_docs.

12 April 2008

Opus and UrbanSim support accessing version numbers (again, after a disappearance for a bit). See VersionNumbersAndReleases for details.

20 January 2008

We are in the process of converting the system to use a new and much more comprehensive GUI built using the PyQt toolkit. Some significant changes:

• Qt and PyQt are now required
• wx and traits are no longer needed
• The installation instructions have been updated to include the PyQt package.
• The Eugene tutorial now describes using the GUI.

Users of a previous release who want to experiment with this should get PyQt, as described in the installation instructions. You can leave wx and traits in your system if you prefer -- they won't interfere with anything.

Release notes moved to the trac wiki.

23 November 2007

The PyXML package is no longer needed.

12 November 2007

We changed our subversion repository to use a more standard trunk/tags/branches scheme: trunk is the current development version, tags holds stable releases, and branches holds branches off of the main trunk (e.g. patches to trunk to make a stable release). Existing subversion users will probably find it easiest to delete the old version of the code, and check out a new revision. Opus version 4.1.1 released -- this is the same as the version of 3 July 2007, except that the install directions are updated to account for the new subversion repository structure.