Overview

Using the ECCO Modelling Software

This documentation describes how to install and run the ECCO modelling software and the accompanying ECCO model of Ireland, as presented at the 'Towards a Sustainable Ireland' conference at the Tipperary Institute in October 2002.

ECCO is a non-standard sustainability modelling approach used to assess technological, economic and social policies and their interactions in national economies. More information about the methodology can be found in the paper in the conferene proceedings, and on the eccosim website.

The software presented here is an incomplete work-in-progress. It is being actively developed, the best point of contact for tracking that development being the eccosim website linked to above. Installation and use is not currently as smooth as we would like, so be prepared to do a bit of work in order to get the software running. We are actively involved in finding ways to improve the 'user-friendliness' of the software, and welcome your constructive suggestions. The software can be run on any version of Microsoft Windows from windows 95 upwards as well as on Macintosh and Linux systems, or any system that supports the java programming language.

The Irish ECCO model can be interacted with in three ways, listed in order of complexity:

Through a graphical mouse-driven user interface, which currently allows the user to specify policies, run simulations and view the results as graphs, but has no facility for saving the simulation data to disk.
A simple command-line program combined with a text specification file allows the model to be run in 'batch mode', generating a large data file that can then be imported into a spreadsheet program such as Microsoft Excel, Lotus, OpenOffice or StarOffice.
The structure of the model may be altered and recompiled into java, after which the revised model may be interacted with in either of the two ways above. This is not necessary for simple policy, only for adding in new sectors or technology options.

Instructions on what needs to be set up, and how to do it are linked to below. In all cases, installation of some third-party software is required before the ECCO model itself can be installed, although only the third option requires getting one's hands dirty. These steps are described too in each case.

graphical interface

batch mode

re-compiling the model

The modelling software is being developed as part of a free software project. As such, the software is made available for free under the proviso that all modifications or extensions to it are released under a similar license, preferably by returning these improvements to the project owner (in this case, me). There is no obligation on a user to contribute to the project, and much of the development is technical in nature, but contributions of documentation, help files, testing, submitting bug reports and other material is also welcome. We will try our best to help users to install and use the software, to fix any bugs that are uncovered, and will consider requests by users to implement new features in the software.

Dave Crane
Bristol, January 2003