Is it time to upgrade your RunDynam? The list below, showing when new features were added, may help to answer this question. A major change occured for Version 3.15 (November 2006). Simulation details saved with 3.15 or later versions cannot be read by earlier versions. This could be an issue if you wished to exchange simulations with someone else.
To discover which version of RunDynam you have, use the menu commands Help...About RunDynam.
Version 3.60 includes the improvements of Versions 3.56 and 3.57 (which were only released to selected customers), and various small bug-fixes in ancillary programs such as ViewHAR, ViewSOL and the Charter. Also, Version 3.60 requires a new licence file (3.5x licences will not work).
It is now easy (though may be time consuming) to carry out Systematic Sensitivity Analysis (SSA) with respect to variations in parameters. The methods and the way results are reported are similar to SSA with RunGEM or RunGTAP. You can do SSA in batch mode.
A bug in TABLO-generated programs and GEMSIM in Release 10.0-002 (April 2010) of GEMPACK meant that Managing MMNZ usually hurt rather than helped. RunDynam has been changed to work around this problem so that, even with that bug, Managing MMNZ now helps again.
RunDynam can now be used with quarterly or monthly models. These are models in which the lengths of periods are measured in quarters or months respectively. [Previously RunDynam only allowed yearly models, namely those in which the lengths of periods are measured in years.] You can use slice words "quarter", "month" or "period" with these quarterly or monthly models when specifying shocks in BSH or PSH files.
RunDynam now usually requires a licence (which is different from your GEMPACK licence).
If you have run a batch job, the next time you start RunDynam not in batch mode, the program will suggest you check the Batch Jobs Log File to see
if the batch job succeeded.
There is a new group of scenario management items under the File menu. Here we use the term "scenario" as an alternative to "simulation details".
Creating a ZIP archive which does not include the model EXE has changed a little. This makes restoring from such a ZIP archive more effective.
You no longer need to provide the Model Information file (MIN file) for models which are prepared with Release 9 (or later) of GEMPACK -- RunDynam can read the AXT or GST file directly.
You can use integer offsets such as <year+1> and <year-2=ABC> when specifying the slice to read shocks from in BSH and PSH files.
RunDynam is able to manage MMNZ values used for simulations. This should speed up simulations in many cases. Feature requires that TG EXE is made with GEMPACK 10.0-002 (April 2010) or later.
We have made changes to:
RunDynam remembers where you last saved a Zip Archive and suggests the same place (folder) when you next save or restore from a Zip Archive. Similarly for Closure/Shocks Zip Archives.
There is a new menu item Save Zip Archive and Restore in Same Place (under the Zip menu) which allows you to save a Zip Archive in a new directory and then immediately restore the files from the Zip Archive into this new directory.
You can now ask RunDynam to show you a combined file showing a logical file (one which relates to a Header Array file - not a text file - which is updated input or is output only) across all relevant years for any run (Base, Base Rerun or Policy). You do this by clicking on the "All Years" item (the last item) in the right-hand list box in the Results for Individual Years on the Results page.
You can now delete all results via the menu item Delete All Results in the Results part of the Zip menu. This deletes those results files which would be zipped up if you selected menu item Zip up All Results under the Zip menu. We are grateful to James Giesecke for suggesting this.
If you have selected an output file (one produced via Write statements in the TAB file) in the type of file box in the Results for Individual Years part of the Results page, what you will see when you click on the View button has changed. Now you will see the file produced during the simulation for the year you select. [Prior to Version 3.35 you would have seen the file produced during the simulation for the year one after the year selected.] We are grateful to Terrie Walmsley for pointing out the problems with the old treatment.
After you have run a Policy, it is possible to ask RunDynam to make this into a new Base case. Then you can investigate other policies starting from this new Base (that is, investigate other policies starting from the old Policy). This is done via the menu item Make Policy the Base under the File menu.
When you make a Zip Archive, if there are any files in the subdirectory EXTRA of your working directory, you are asked if you want to include all such files in the Zip Archive. [If so, these files are put into EXTRA2.ZIP inside the Zip Archive. Subdirectories inside EXTRA are preserved there.]
We are grateful to James Giesecke for suggesting this feature. We believe that this will make it much easier for users to group together auxiliary files and to make sure that these files don't get lost when making a new Zip Archive.
When you restore from a Zip Archive, all files in EXTRA2.ZIP are restored into subdirectory EXTRA (not EXTRA2) of the directory into which you are restoring the files. Again subdirectories are preserved inside EXTRA in that case.
Perhaps confusingly (we do it for backwards compatibility), you are also asked (as before) if you wish to add some extra files to the Zip Archive. These can be taken from anywhere on the disk and go into EXTRA.ZIP in the Zip Archive. When you restore from a Zip Archive, files in EXTRA.ZIP also go into subdirectory EXTRA of the directory into which you are restoring (as before Version 3.33).
Several power users want to be able to run two or more versions of RunDynam in order to take advantage of PCs with several (4 or more) processors. They want to be able to use one copy of RunDynam to solve one dynamic simulation (Base and Policy) and to use another copy of RunDynam to solve a second dynamic simulation at the same time.
We are grateful to Guy Jakeman who suggested this change.
As developers, we (somewhat apprehensively) say "yes" to the power users who need this feature, and we tell those who try it that it is a case of User Beware. We strongly urge all others to keep to the simple and proven strategy of only running one copy of the EXE we supply.
When you ask to view the main TABLO file or the TABLO STI file (see the View menu), RunDynam always extracts these from the AXT or GST file for the model. These files are also always extracted when making a ZIP archive (to make sure that they are up-to-date in the ZIP archive).
The statements TFinal_Level, AChange, TChange, APercent_Change and TPercent_Change [new for Release 10 of GEMPACK] are now allowed in BSH and PSH files. We are grateful to James Giesecke for suggesting that these statements could be useful in RunDynam.
Various minor bug fixes.
Some bugs relating to batch jobs were fixed. The DOS ErrorLevel is now set to 1 if RunDynam encounters a fatal error when running in batch mode: you can use this in the BAT files used to run RunDynam in batch mode.
ashock and tshock statements are now allowed in Base Case Shocks files. This was suggested by Philip Adams, who sometimes needs to convert a Policy scenario to be a Base case.
A serious bug relating to Rational Expectations was fixed. If the version of RunDynam you are using offers Rational Expectations, please see What's New in the Rational Expectations Help file (select the Help menu item under the Rational Expectations menu) for details.
A new way of storing Simulation Details was introduced in order to reduce (unfortunately, not eliminate) problems which may occur when old versions of this program (Version 3.14 or earlier) read Simulation Details saved by Version 3.18 or later.
The short name of a data file (in the Data part of the Model/Data page) must be different from the name of any file on the Closure/Shocks page or of any file referred to in a file on the Closure/Shocks page.
The major change relates to the Common row and the CMFSTART row near the top of the Closure/Shocks page. File names on this page can now have up to 9 characters (plus 3-character suffix). CMFSTART file names are no longer restricted to CMFSTART, CMFSTARTB, CMFSTARTR and CMFSTARTP.
Please note that Simulation details saved with this or later versions of RunDynam cannot be read by Version 3.14 or earlier. This includes Simulation details saved in ZIP archives. So, for example, you should not attempt to send ZIP archives saved with Version 3.15 or later to a user with Version 3.14 or earlier. A subsequent change made with Version 3.18 slightly reduced this problem.
You can no longer type in names of files on the Closure/Shocks page - rather you need to select files using the menu obtained when you right click on a cell.
If you right-click on one of the Closure cells on the Closure/Shocks page, you can ask to check the closure and save an Environment file.
The number of periods can now have 3 digits (so up to 999 periods are allowed).
The names of Output data files (those produced using Write statements in the TAB file) have been changed to include the beginning and ending year of the simulation which produces them.
There is a new option telling the software to ignore patterns for files on the Closure/Shocks page when Sim Names are changed.
RunDynam now allows individual simulations to cover one or more years. The lengths of the simulation periods are indicated via a drop-down list on the Sim Overview page. This makes important changes in the top part of the Sim Overview page. We use the word "period" to indicate the number of years covered by individual simulations. If one period covers more than one year, the years for which updated data will be produced will not be consecutive. Examples will make this clearer. [Prior to Version 3.14, only the version of this software used with the Dynamic GTAP model allowed periods of more than one year. Now all versions of this software allow periods of more than one year.]
On machines with 3 or more processors, the software can solve three simulations at once. This can result in a reduction of 50% or more in the total time taken for a whole run (Base, Rerun and Policy, or Base and Policy).
There is a Run All button.
You can put shocks for several years on a single header in a Header Array file, and instruct RunDynam to read the shocks for the relevant year. This only works with models processed with Release 9 or later of GEMPACK.
You can run RunDynam in batch mode. This allows you to set up several jobs which will run in sequence. These can be for different applications or different sets of Policy shocks etc. For example, this lets you run several parts of several applications overnight, after you leave your office for the day.
You can load Closure/Shocks files from all selected cells into your text editor.
The key word "save" is allowed in Closure files so that you can save an Environment file from any year.
You can now tell RunDynam to ignore any arithmetic errors which occur when doing spreadsheet jobs.
This completes the major rewrite carried out for Version 3.0 (November 2003).
The main change is that simulations now produce files with long file names. This makes managing several different applications in the same directory much easier.
· This restricts the Models that can be used to those created using Release 7.0 or later of GEMPACK. Model EXEs made with the Fortran compiler F77L3 cannot be used with this version of RunDynam.
· However (and this is important), Simulation Details files and ZIP archives produced with earlier versions of RunDynam can still be used with the current version. So it is still possible to load applications archived with earlier versions.
· Unfortunately, this change to long file names means that current versions of RunDynam may not give reliable information (when job completed, time, date and size of files produced etc) about jobs run with Version 3.0 (November 2003) and cannot give information about jobs run with earlier versions of RunDynam.
I encourage all experienced users to read the topic Sim Names and to follow the links from there. Understanding the related ideas is vital if you wish to make effective use of RunDynam to manage several different applications. The importance of the Sim Names and of switching between applications using "Load Sim Details" was not made clear with earlier versions of this software. I hope that it is now considerably easier to understand these ideas. The software developers will be grateful for suggestions as to how to communicate these ideas better.
You can now restore an application from a Zip Archive and restore its results from a Results Zip file and get a satisfactory answer to "Are Results Still Ok?" without running any of the jobs again. Similarly you can pass applications and results to a colleague who can restore them and receive a satisfactory answer to "Are Results Still Ok?" without running any of the jobs.
There is a new AnalyseGE button in the Results for All/Several Years part of the Results page. You can use this to load the cumulative differences results into AnalyseGE. You can also load cumulative results from several consecutive years of any run into AnalyseGE.
Various items on the File menu were moved to a new Zip menu. Various items on the Options menu were moved to a new Run Preferences menu. I am grateful to Jill Harrison for suggesting this.
The end of the File menu contains the names of the Simulation Details files you have accessed most recently. If you click on any one of these, those Simulation Details will be loaded.
When you add extra files to a Zip archive, you can select several files each time you click on the "Add" button.
You can specify an alternative solution method which is to be used for some years.
You can specify which AnalyseGE to use.
If you are an experienced user, you can ask RunDynam to give fewer messages and questions.
You can ask RunDynam never to check that the prerequisites are ok before running a job.
You can hide the Rational Expectations menu and part of the Sim Overview page if the version of RunDynam you are running offers Rational Expectations.
This was a major rewrite with many new features.
See also
RunDynam Information