Re: [boost] Fwd: ODEInt review

Subject: Re: [boost] Fwd: ODEInt review
From: Hal Finkel (hfinkel_at_[hidden])
Date: 2012-10-02 14:46:11

On Tue, 02 Oct 2012 11:15:33 -0700
Steven Watanabe <watanabesj_at_[hidden]> wrote:

> 
> 
> -------- Original Message --------
> Subject: ODEInt review
> Date: Wed, 26 Sep 2012 11:48:18 -0400
> From: Reese, Greg Dr. <greg.reese_at_[hidden]>
> To: watanabesj_at_[hidden] <watanabesj_at_[hidden]>
> CC: Reese, Greg Dr. <greg.reese_at_[hidden]>
> 
> Please always state in your review, whether you think the library
> should be accepted as a Boost library!
> 
> Absolutely!
> 
> 
> 
> - What is your evaluation of the design?
> 
> Good. Good use of policies
> 
> 
> 
> Is it necessary to set an initial step size on the adaptive
> integrators? Shouldn't they be able to
> 
> figure this out on their own? If the size is needed, maybe it could
> have a default value so the
> 
> user doesn't have to pass the argument.
> 
> 
> 
> - What is your evaluation of the implementation?
> 
> Appears to be good but I didn't look at code in detail.
> 
> 
> 
> - What is your evaluation of the documentation?
> 
> Excellent! Probably the best documentation of any Boost library.
> 
> Suggestions:
> 
> 1) Add general explanation of "observers", e.g., what they do, sample
> uses.
> 
> 2) In documentation of example programs, add plots of outputs. These
> help users decide
> 
> if the program ran correctly and if they're interpreting the outputs
> correctly
> 
> 
> 
> - What is your evaluation of the potential usefulness of the library?
> 
> Extremely useful to C++ programmers who want to incorporate ODE
> solutions into their code
> 
> 
> 
> - Did you try to use the library?  With what compiler?  Did you have
> any problems?
> 
> Used Microsoft Visual C++ 2012. No problems.
> 
> 
> 
> - How much effort did you put into your evaluation? A glance? A quick
> reading? In-depth study?
> 
> 2-3 hours. Read through documentation, ran a number of sample programs
> 
> 
> 
> - Are you knowledgeable about the problem domain?
> 
> Yes
> 
> 
> 
> Suggestion for future (not current!) version - add capability for user
> routines to stop the
> 
> Integration process. This is useful for breaking out of periodic
> solutions, for stopping
> 
> the computations if the solution attains meaningless values, and for
> limiting the amount
> 
> of running time.  See, for example, "Event Location" at
> http://www.mathworks.com/help/matlab/math/ordinary-differential-equations.html#f1-669698
> 
> 
> 
> Perhaps this capability can be incorporated into the observers.

Out of curiosity, why is this not possible now by throwing an exception
from the observer (or the RHS evaluation)?

 -Hal

> 
> 
> 
> Greg Reese
> 
> 
> 
> 
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-- 
Hal Finkel
Postdoctoral Appointee
Leadership Computing Facility
Argonne National Laboratory