hm I think I actually disagree with this. What you described in the docs now is a more advanced setup, for users that want to take one of the example cases and modify it as they like. In that case it is important to check which changes require the pre-processing scripts.
What I have in mind as primary case is new users, that just want to try out what the uDALES simulation does. In that case, there is no need to set up copies of the simulation setup, you can just run them right from the u-dales/examples/xxx folder.
I don't think we can get this entirely right at the moment, since also the docs for the pre-processing are still in progress (on the pre-proc branch) and there is some overlap with these as well which we can address when everything is in one place (for example Table 1 could be moved to the pre-proc docs).
For the da_prep.sh: the png images are needed for setting up the building layout from the LIDAR data (a pre-processing step, which has already been executed in the 502 example and the layout is saved to blocks.inp.502), which you do not need to copy across, because you copy the blocks.inp file. The *driver*files on the other hand are needed for every run of an externally forced simulation, so we do need to have them in each simulation setup folder. This step in da_prep.sh is useful, for example, if you want to run the same externally forced simulation but with different pollution sources, hence you need to set up two similar simulations where just the scalar.inp file changes.
I'll have a go later on to see if I can incorporate some of your suggestions to the docs. Your comments are very useful as they clearly show where things are not well enough explained, but I can't really spend much more time on this now (I had hoped to finally get this thing off my list... 😄 )
hm I think I actually disagree with this. What you described in the docs now is a more advanced setup, for users that want to take one of the example cases and modify it as they like. In that case it is important to check which changes require the pre-processing scripts.
What I have in mind as primary case is new users, that just want to try out what the uDALES simulation does. In that case, there is no need to set up copies of the simulation setup, you can just run them right from the u-dales/examples/xxx folder.
I don't think we can get this entirely right at the moment, since also the docs for the pre-processing are still in progress (on the pre-proc branch) and there is some overlap with these as well which we can address when everything is in one place (for example Table 1 could be moved to the pre-proc docs).
For the
da_prep.sh: the png images are needed for setting up the building layout from the LIDAR data (a pre-processing step, which has already been executed in the 502 example and the layout is saved toblocks.inp.502), which you do not need to copy across, because you copy theblocks.inpfile. The*driver*files on the other hand are needed for every run of an externally forced simulation, so we do need to have them in each simulation setup folder. This step inda_prep.shis useful, for example, if you want to run the same externally forced simulation but with different pollution sources, hence you need to set up two similar simulations where just thescalar.inpfile changes.I'll have a go later on to see if I can incorporate some of your suggestions to the docs. Your comments are very useful as they clearly show where things are not well enough explained, but I can't really spend much more time on this now (I had hoped to finally get this thing off my list... 😄 )