Graphical user interface to perform glacier simulations with PISM

Computer simulations of glacial dynamics help us understand how glaciers respond to changes in climate, such as warming temperatures and increased precipitation. Simulations are performed with PISM (Parallel Ice Sheet Model). To tackle the complexities of ice dynamics, PISM employs several sub-models for various aspects and thus exposes a plethora of parameters. There are also several options for setting parameter values, i.e. through config files, command line options or input files. To get a good handle on all the provided buttons and knobs, we developed a user interface for setting parameters of out simulations and for executing PISM with the selected set of parameters on a remote workstation.In this paper we present the GUI developed in Jupyter and deployed in a local JupyterLab installation. The environment contains DEM files, Python scripts and other inputs locally but connects to a 128-core workstation for simulation execution. The simulation inputs and outputs are transferred between the computers over an SSH connection. The GUI is publicly exposed in a single-user environment, only for use, while development is performed on a git repository which is then synchronized to the public through git. This approach is general enough to be used on other software as well.