Liberty & The State of the World

Fun with GISTEMP

cdquarles — Sat, 02 May 2009 21:50:50 +0000

Just for kicks I have attempted to compile NASA’s GISTEMP source code. I downloaded a fresh copy of the code, and I collected the archival versions that I have downloaded previously since the code was first posted in 2007. I use Windows . I am writing this post on a system running Windows 7 Beta x64 Ultimate. The code documentation lists the OS requirements as Unix-like. OK. The Unix-like environments that I have are the Windows ‘native’ Subsystem for Unix Applications that is the current implementation of the old NT POSIX subsystem. Great, I’m using the Beta, so using the SUA isn’t supported yet . I have the Cygwin environment that emulates *nix. I have several Ubuntu Linux distros running under Microsoft Virtual PC 2007 and Sun’s Virtual Box.

First Attempt: Cygwin environment. Use export command to set an environment variable named FC to use g95. No joy. Syntax errors galore. Shell errors too. What Fortran compiler did they use? Documentation’s unclear. GISS compiler command list shows f90, ifort, and xlf90 -qfixed. What Fortran standard are they using? FORTRAN IV/66, FORTRAN 77, Fortran 90, Fortran 95, Fortran 20xx? Hm, given the list, probably F77 or F90. Looking at the *.f files it looks like F77. Nice, I guess NASA’s still using code first written in the mid 80′s that has had a few student’s summer job and/or minty fresh postdoc’s ministrations tacked on over the years.

Second attempt: Cygwin environment. Set the FC environment variable to g77. Oh boy, more of the same syntax and shell errors noted above.

Third and fourth attempts: Cygwin environment. Set the FC variable back to g95. Use the second oldest and most recent archival copies. Same result as before. Compile fails but the syntax errors are gone. Shell errors only.

Fifth and sixth attempts: Cygwin environment and FC set to g77. No joy. Results are the same as the previous two attempts.

Seventh attempt: Cygwin environment and FC set to g95. Use the fresh copy. Nice, the syntax errors are back.

Eighth attempt: Cygwin environment and FC set to g77 using the fresh copy. Same result as #7.

Sigh. Is this one of the bases used to justify my being robbed in taxes to pay for, and threated with jail or death if I dare question the soundness of the premises used to scare me into accepting tyranny and slavery; or called a denier [implied moral equivalence to a Holocaust Denier like little Hugo Chavez or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad]?

Next set of four attempts: Cygwin environment, FC set to gfortran. Wonderful, same syntax errors (9 and 12) and shell errors (9 to 12).

Okay, time to look again at the suggested compiler list. Absoft’s f90 is $$$ with a time limited free trial period whether we are going to use straight Windows or Linux. I decided not to try to install the free trial into Cygwin. Next is Intel’s ifort. Hey, it’s free for personal use in a Linux environment. I’ll try this one. Oops, can’t install it in Cygwin. Off to Ubuntu for you to be checked out later. Finally, there’s IBM’s XL Fortran. Gee, $$$ with a time limited free trial. No, I don’t think I’ll try to download you and attempt the Cygwin install. Looks like the Cygwin install for these will only be by building from source.

Back to the drawing board. I’ll have to try manual compilation of each step’s sub-step executables. Who thinks that this will be a good use of time outside of academia? And I’ll have to try to fix the shell scripts to get rid of the shell diagnostic messages. I’d rather spend the time learning R than tinkering with bash. Off to Ubuntuland, got to get Jaunty Jackalope up and running.

Update 5/5/09: I have Ubuntu 9.04 up. I installed gfortran, g95, and the personal use version of Intel’s Fortran Compiler 11.0.083. No joy in getting GISTEMP to compile. More of same script errors in bash or Fortran syntax errors. I wonder what the magic specs, shell options, and compiler options were used to get it to run.

–”It never ceases to amaze me that people, especially leftist politicians, think that you can wave a magic wand and repeal the laws of physics, chemistry, and economics.”

Posted in Miscellaneous, Politics, Science Tagged: "Climate Science", Computer Programming, Fads, GISS, Global Warming, Human Folly, Human Nature, Politics, Science

Snowy Alabama

cdquarles — Sun, 01 Mar 2009 16:39:58 +0000

Snow In Alabama #4

Snow in Alabama #3

Snow in Alabama #2

Snow in Alabama #1

See some March weather in Alabama . Yes, you are looking at snow. It is more likely to snow here in March than December, ‘Global Warming’ notwithstanding.

Posted in Miscellaneous Tagged: Weather

Capitalism Rules, Socialism Drools

cdquarles — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 17:16:11 +0000

Steve McIntyre posted this ClimateAudit.org. After making a comment there and reading the subsequent comments, it became clear to me that this phenomenon explains, profoundly, another reason why the Austrian School of economics works best; and why Ludwig von Mises correctly described why socialism fails as an economic theory. Socialism is a religion, capitalism is not. Equality under God and before the law is the only kind of equality there is. Don’t agree or think so? Check out Shirky’s Power Laws and ponder deeply the linked Andrew Sullivan post as well as commentary for Steve McIntyre’s post.

Posted in Economics, Philosophy, Science

My Absence

cdquarles — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 05:33:26 +0000

I’m back after a long, wearying absence. My mother had been hospitalized after an injury for which she is undergoing rehabilitation.

Posted in Miscellaneous Tagged: Life, Musings

Hurricane Season 2008 Early September Update

cdquarles — Wed, 03 Sep 2008 06:43:16 +0000

It is peak of the season time. The ‘F’ storm, Fay, passed near me and left behind a big batch of tornadoes and some flooding. Just what the doctor ordered to help ease the multi-year drought around here. The ‘G’ storm, passed through Louisiana as a Cat-2 at landfall, after peaking as a Cat-4 after wreaking death and destruction on Jamaica, the Cayman Islands and western Cuba. Gustav’s damage totals are yet to be finalized.

Out in the Atlantc, we have the H, I, and J storms. Hannah, could pass east of me this weekend. Ike is a long way of north of the Greater Antilles. Josephine, is a Cape Verde storm that will take more than a week to reach the US should it make it this far west. After this burst of activity, I expect things to shift to the Eastern Pacific and quiet down in the Atlantic for a couple of weeks.

Hurricane Season 2008 August Update

cdquarles — Fri, 08 Aug 2008 14:03:35 +0000

After a burst of activity in mid July, tropical cyclone activity declined to a low level for nearly a week. Since that lull, tropical systems developed in the Gulf of Mexico, the Eastern Pacific Ocean, the Central Pacific Ocean, and the Western Pacific Ocean. There are two systems being monitored today. With the peak of the Atlantic season approaching (mid August to mid October), forecasts of an active season will soon be tested by the real atmosphere .

Hurricane Season 2008 July Update

cdquarles — Mon, 21 Jul 2008 13:50:18 +0000

We are now eight weeks into the Atlantic hurricane season and ten weeks into the Eastern Pacific hurricane season. The Atlantic basin has had 4 named storms so far, and the Eastern Pacific basin has had 6 named storms. Hurricane Bertha, which remained out to sea, brushed Bermuda with tropical storm force winds. Bertha briefly hit Cat-3 status and apparently been the longest lived July storm (fairly complete records are only some 50 years in length). With the busiest part of the season beginning in about 4 weeks, how active this season will be remains to be determined. Remember that wind shear is more important than sea surface temperature once the threshold of 25C has been reached for tropical storm development.

Barack’s Birth Certificate Blogswarm

cdquarles — Sat, 05 Jul 2008 15:27:27 +0000

Barack Hussein Obama’s birth certificate flap, and his “fight the smears” website, continue to cause a stir. A number of sites have examined and discussed the examination of a graphic posted on the Daily Kos and the Obama campaign’s Fight the Smears site. No one has yet made a big todo over the most important aspect of the graphic to me. If you want to ‘fight the smears’, as it were, you need to post a certified copy with the certificate number unredacted. Redacting the certificate number makes people more suspicious of the posting, precisely because it precluded checking to see if the number matches the information disclosed in the graphic.

Let me repeat the importance of this. That the graphic has been processed through Photoshop means a whole lot less if the certificate number matches the certified original’s certificate number and the rest of the information also matches. Likewise, the most damaging aspect to this apparent forgery is if the redacted certificate number does not match the certified original Certificate of Live Birth for Barack Hussein Obama II.

–”It never ceases to amaze me that people,especially leftist politicians, think that you can wave a magic wand and repeal the laws of physics, chemistry, and economics.”

Life Milestones II

cdquarles — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 04:12:51 +0000

My baby’s birthday! Happy Birthday, April!

USA b. 7/4/1776 d. 6/12/2008, CPR in Progress

cdquarles — Thu, 26 Jun 2008 17:00:15 +0000

Three or so weeks back, the Supreme Court of the United States, in a fit of arrogant pique handed down a deadly decision. Said decision violated the Constitution by dismissing the two political branches powers enumerated in Article I and Article II. Congress declared war, repeatly from 1991 on against Saddam Hussein and other non State actors perpetrating acts of war against us. The President, acting as authorized by the war declaration used his Article II powers to detain illegal combatants for the duration of the war, if it so chose. Congress, following an earlier arrogant usupation, took away from the Supreme Court the power to hear and rule upon certain petitions presented by said illegal combatants.

Today, the Supreme Court issued a ruling that was not only completely within its jurisdiction, it was correctly decided. That is the silver lining. The cloud is that the ruling is, properly so, narrow; and that it was 5 to 4, with one of the dark side justices joining the Fab Four this time. Convincing this ‘swing Justice’ to join the side of the angels this time probably was bought by watering it down somewhat.

Nevertheless, today’s decision is a good one for the Republic known as the United States of America.