Software tools were constructed to address issues the NASA Fortran development community faces, and they were tested on real models currently in use at NASA. These proof-of-concept tools address the High-End Computing Program and the Modeling, Analysis, and Prediction Program. Two examples are the NASA Goddard Earth Observing System Model, Version 5 (GEOS-5) atmospheric model in Cell Fortran on the Cell Broadband Engine, and the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) coupled atmosphere-ocean model called ModelE, written in fixed format Fortran.
To test the tool set, the innovators first extended an annotation and conversation mechanism, known as Activities, allowing developers to provide insights into code without modifying it to include the qualification of Activities with metadata for filtering. Next, the designers created a visualization to present the relationships, or connectivity, between model variables by tracing various constructs through different components and levels of a model. Also, a type replacement facility was tested for updating primitive types such as such as integers that were not qualified with a size, and thus may change as the underlying architecture is upgraded. Finally, the designers leveraged a tool, called eclim, to bridge the gap between text editors and Integrated Development Environments (IDE), by running both of them simultaneously, and set up to communicate with each other. Through this mechanism, modern IDE features were made available through text editors, minimizing the learning curve for scientists already experienced with their conventions.
This work was done by Marc Abrams, Pallabi Saboo, and Mike Sonsini of Harmonia Holdings Group, LLC for Goddard Space Flight Center. GSC-16475-1
