Python Common Entities for Science (PyCES)

PyCES is a standard set of objects and classes for scientific computing using the Python object-oriented scripting language. Initially, PyCES is concentrating on basic physical entities and properties (such as abstract particles, quantities, and vectors). It will expand to deal with more complex entities, such as macroscopic bodies, fluids, molecules, atoms, and nuclei in the future. The eventual goal is to have a set of useful foundation classes describing all entities encountered in scientific computing.

Python, rather than a system programming language like C++ or Java, is used for several reasons:

• Objects are cleanly distinguished from functional implementation. Classes and objects belong to the scripting layer, while computer-intensive "number crunching" is performed by efficient C functions.
• Python is platform independent (like Java), but is also open source and freely available.
• Existing C and C++ functions can be embedded in Python scripts
• Graphical user interfaces (Python/Tkinter, wxPython) are available

The distinction of the object and functional layers parallels the three-tier architectures used in business applications, where the user interface, object set, and database implementation are kept distinct. The use of an intermediate object layer provides a standard interface to the database, which can be modified without requiring changes in the user interface and vice-versa. In like fashion, PyCES separates the objects which are used to model a physical system from implementation details of functions used to operate on the objects.

If you are interested in PyCES, please email cblilie@prairiescholar.net