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Introduction

What will you learn?

  • What Dinamica EGO is
  • What a functor is
  • How this guidebook is structured



Welcome to Dinamica Environment for Geoprocessing Objects (Dinamica EGO)!



EGO stands for Environment for Geoprocessing Objects. The previous version of Dinamica was totally reengineered to become a modeling environment, now with outstanding possibilities for the design from the very simple static spatial model to very complex dynamic ones, which can ultimately involve nested iterations, dynamic feedbacks, multi-region approach, manipulation and algebraic combination of data in several formats, such as maps, tables, matrices and constants, decision processes for bifurcating and joining execution pipelines, and a series of complex spatial algorithms for the analysis and simulation of space-time phenomena.

The software environment, written in C++ and Java, holds a series of algorithms called functors. Each functor performs an operation. To date, we have implemented the most common spatial analysis algorithms available in commercial GIS (Geographic Information System), plus a series of algorithms especially designed for spatial simulations, including transition functions, calibration and validation methods.

These functors are sequenced to establish data flow in the form of graphs. Through the Dinamica EGO graphical interface one can create models by simply dragging and connecting functors via their ports, which represent connectors to types of data, such as maps, tables, matrices, mathematical expressions and constants. Functors can be enveloped by “containers”, a special type of functor that is used, for example, to execute iterations or process data from specific regions of a map. Thus models can be designed as a diagram and execution follows a data flow chain. This friendly interface permits the design of simple to very complex spatial models that are saved in a script language in XML format or EGO programming language.

In sum, Dinamica EGO software favors simplicity, flexibility and good performance, optimizing speed and computer resources, such as memory and parallel processing. Most of its algorithms are designed to take advantage of multicore processor architecture. In addition, Dinamica EGO handles large raster format using disk paging. On the other hand, if memory is available, it can load all the input maps at the beginning of a model execution and keep them in memory only while they are needed. In this way, the software only accesses the disk at the end of an execution to write the final outputs or, if a user specifies, at the end of an iteration to save the output maps from each time step.

This document is the original user guide of the described Dinamica EGO. The aim of this guidebook is to introduce the user to the innumerous possibilities of Dinamica EGO for the design of models that can fully represent the complexity of various geographic phenomena.

This document contains internal links. Clicking on an internal link opens an Dinamica Website. Links are shown in blue and are handled by the system browser.

Modular Guidebook Structure

This Guidebook are modular in structure (Modeling Environmental Dynamics with Dinamica EGO). Each module is divided into lessons and is assigned a particular level in a progressive series:

MODULE I: Welcome to Dinamica EGO!

MODULE II: Working with maps on Dinamica EGO

MODULE III: Working with tables on Dinamica EGO

MODULE IV: Creating and using Submodels on Dinamica EGO

MODULE V: Incorporating control structures into a model on Dinamica EGO

MODULE VI: Advanced spatial analyses on Dinamica EGO

MODULE VII: Other Applications of Dinamica EGO

We hope you can learn about the software and use it for countless environmental applications. GOOD LUCK!