beecs-cli

Command line interface for the beecs honeybee model and derivatives.

Features

• Model parametrization from JSON files.
• Parallelized simulation experiments, with parameter variation configured via JSON.
• 100% reproducible simulation experiments.
• Various real-time visualizations for debugging and model exploration.
• All this, even for derived models with altered sub-models, state variables etc.

For a graphical user interface for the beecs model, see beecs-ui.

Installation

Pre-compiled binaries for Linux, Windows and MacOS are available in the Releases.

To install the latest development version using Go, run:

go install github.com/mlange-42/beecs-cli@main

Note: Use beecs-cli instead of beecs in the examples below in this case.

CLI usage

Get CLI help like this:

beecs -h

A single simulation with live plots, at 30 ticks per second:

beecs -d _examples/base --observers --tps 30

Run the full base example with parameter variation and 10 runs per parameter set:

beecs -d _examples/base --observers --experiment -r 10

Print all default parameters in the tool's input format:

beecs parameters

Create input file templates in the current directory:

beecs init

Library usage

With beecs-cli, it also is possible to fully parameterize models derived from the original beecs model, although they use custom systems and/or parameters and global state variables.

An example for how to modify beecs while using beecs-cli is provided by the repository beecs-template.

Input files

All file locations are relative to the working directory given by -d (defaults to the current directory).

One or more parameter files are required. Entries in those files overwrite the default parameters. The default is file parameters.json in the working directory. Here is an example:

{
    "Parameters": {
        "Termination": {
            "MaxTicks": 365
        },
        "InitialPopulation": {
            "Count": 25000
        }
    }
}

For any kind of output, an observers file is required. It specifies which observers for visualizations or file output should be used. Here is an example:

{
    "Parameters": "out/Parameters.csv",
    "Tables": [
        {
            "Observer": "obs.WorkerCohorts",
            "File": "out/WorkerCohorts.csv"
        }
    ],
}

Observers must be enabled using the -o flag. The default is file observers.json in the working directory.

These files are sufficient for single simulations with visual of file output.

With a further experiment file, parameters can be systematically varied in various ways. Here is an example:

{
    "Seed": 123,
    "Parameters": [
        {
            "Parameter": "params.Nursing.MaxBroodNurseRatio",
            "SequenceFloatRange": {
                "Min": 2.0,
                "Max": 4.0,
                "Values": 11
            }
        },
        {
            "Parameter": "params.Nursing.ForagerNursingContribution",
            "SequenceFloatValues": {
                "Values": [0, 0.25, 0.5]
            }
        }
    ]
}

Experiments must be enabled using the -e flag. The default is file experiments.json in the working directory.

Note: The prefix params. is required to unambiguously identify the type of the parameter group to modify.

See also the examples for the format of the required JSON files.