Summary of the successful message-ix installation on macOS

[marek-iiasa]

I summarize the message-ix installation on macOS Big Sur version 11.4 based on (to a large extend overlapping) comments by Francesco and Oliver.

Francesco in #480:
conda config --prepend channels conda-forge
conda config --set channel_priority strict
conda create --name message_env
conda activate message_env
conda install message-ix
---
Oliver in #482:
I did the install this morning on macOS:
step1. I deleted Anaconda and GAMS.
step2. rebooted machine.
step3. installed GAMS 35.2 (including ticking the box to add to PATH)
step4. installed anaconda3-2021.05
step5. installed messageix via anaconda following each step of the instructions with the addition of setting channel priority to strict.
step5. downloaded tutorials
step6. started jupyter notebook from the command-line ensuring environment 'message_env' is active.
---

I skipped Oliver's steps 1 through 4 (didn't want to risk loosing the stuff in another, earlier created, env; I also wanted to avoid GAMS reinstallation). Based on further comments of Oliver I didn't define JAVA_HOME, and have hidden the JDK.

Therefore, the only preparation I found necessary: GAMS properly installed and included in $PATH.

Here are the steps of my installation:

Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda update --all
Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda config --prepend channels conda-forge
Warning: 'conda-forge' already in 'channels' list, moving to the top
Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda config --set channel_priority strict
Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda create --name msg_env
Ba4:wrksp marek$ cat ~/.condarc
ssl_verify: true
channels:
  - conda-forge
  - defaults
auto_activate_base: false
channel_priority: strict
Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda --version
conda 4.10.1
Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda activate msg_env
(msg_env) Ba4:wrksp marek$ echo $PATH
/Users/marek/anaconda3/envs/msg_env/bin:/Library/Frameworks/GAMS.framework/Resources:/Applications/anaconda3/condabin:/anaconda3/bin:.:/usr/local/git/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/Users/marek/bin:/Users/marek/src/mcma/ScriptsMac:/Library/TeX/texbin:/Library/Apple/usr/bin
(msg_env) Ba4:wrksp marek$ conda install message-ix
(msg_env) Ba4:wrksp marek$ message-ix show-versions

ixmp:        3.3.0
message_ix:  3.3.0
message_ix_models: None
message_data: None

click:       8.0.1
dask:        2021.06.0
genno:       installed
graphviz:    None
jpype:       1.2.1
… JVM path:  /Users/marek/anaconda3/envs/msg_env/lib/jli/libjli.dylib
openpyxl:    3.0.7
pandas:      1.2.4
pint:        0.17
xarray:      0.18.2
yaml:        5.4.1

iam_units:   installed
jupyter:     installed
matplotlib:  3.4.2
plotnine:    0.8.0
pyam:        0.11.0

GAMS:        35.2.0

python:      3.9.4 | packaged by conda-forge | (default, May 10 2021, 22:13:15) 
[Clang 11.1.0 ]
python-bits: 64
OS:          Darwin
OS-release:  20.5.0
machine:     x86_64
processor:   i386
byteorder:   little
LC_ALL:      None
LANG:        None
LOCALE:      (None, 'UTF-8')

(msg_env) Ba4:wrksp marek$ jupyter notebook

Thus, Oliver's and mine environments appear to be the same (except of versions of pyam and macOS).

I run without problems both the coffee-machine and westeros_baseline notebooks. BTW: initial run resulted in errors; then I figured out that one should restart the kernel & clean output at starting the already run *.ipynb. The latter might be a useful tip for less experienced in jupyter, like myself.

Summing-up the message-ix installation prerequisites: it appears that neither definition of JAVA_HOME nor installation of JDK are needed; whether or not one of them caused problems with my earlier installations remains unclear.

I do hope that the above summary can help in improving the installation instructions, and maybe also in answering future questions about the installation.

[francescolovat]

Thank you @marek-iiasa!

It then seems that the sequence of steps that I posted (based on testing efforts from @awais307) is a quite robust way to install message-ix from conda -it also worked with other participants in Slack.

We'll account for that and improve the documentation where needed.

[LauWien]

Thank you for this summary! Since PR #501 got merged and handling Jupyter Notebooks is covered in the Prerequisite knowledge & skills, I'm closing this issue.