libecl is a package for reading and writing the result files from the Eclipse reservoir simulator. The file types covered are the restart, init, rft, summary and grid files. Both unified and non-unified and formatted and unformatted files are supported.
libecl is mainly developed on Linux and macOS, in addition there is a portability layer which ensures that most of the functionality is available on Windows. The main functionality is written in C/C++, and should typically be linked in in other compiled programs. libecl was initially developed as part of the Ensemble Reservoir Tool, other applications using libecl are the reservoir simulator flow and Resinsight from the OPM project.
For small interactive scripts, such as forward models, the recommended way to
use libecl is by installing it from PyPI. This method doesn't require setting
PYTHONPATH
or LD_LIBRARY_PATH
environment variables:
$ pip install libecl
This is for when you need to link directly with the libecl C library, but don't need the Python bindings. libecl requires a conforming C++11 or later compiler such as GNU GCC, the CMake build system and, optionally, zlib.
$ git clone https://github.com/Equinor/libecl
$ mkdir libecl/build
$ cd libecl/build
$ cmake ..
$ make
$ make install
To install libecl in a non-standard location, add
-DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=/path/to/install
to the first cmake
command. Remember
to set LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/path/to/install/lib64:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
if you do use a
non-standard location for your program to find libecl.so
.
If you intend to develop and change libecl you should build the tests by
passing -DBUILD_TESTS=ON
and run the tests with ctest
.
It is also possible to install both the C library and Python bindings using CMake. Note that this alternative is incompatible with libecl installed from PyPI (Alternative 1). As before, we require a conforming C++11 or later compiler, CMake and, optionally, zlib.
$ git clone https://github.com/Equinor/libecl
$ mkdir libecl/build
$ cd libecl/build
$ pip install -r ../requirements.txt
$ cmake .. -DENABLE_PYTHON=ON
$ make
$ make install
You will most likely want to install libecl into a Python virtual environment.
First activate the virtualenv, then add the argument
-DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$(python -c "import sys; print(sys.prefix)")
to the
cmake
command when building.
Then, you must tell Python where to find the package[1]:
$ export PYTHONPATH=/path/to/install/lib/python2.7/site-packages:$PYTHONPATH
$ export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=/path/to/install/lib64:$LD_LIBRARY_PATH
Then you can fire up your Python interpreter and try it out:
>>> from ecl.summary import EclSum
>>> import sys
>>> summary = EclSum(sys.argv[1])
>>> fopt = summary.numpy_vector("FOPT")
The installation with Python enabled is described in a YouTube video by Carl Fredrik Berg.
[1]: The exact paths here will depend on your system and Python version. The example given is for a RedHat system with Python version 2.7.