Quickstart

To get started, first install signac and signac-flow, then set up a new project with:

~ $ mkdir my_project
~ $ cd my_project/
~/my_project $ signac init
Initialized project.

Important

If you need to interface with non-Python code, see Using signac-flow with MATLAB or other software without Python interface.

Once a project has been created, the next step is to initialize the data space with, e.g., a script called init.py.:

# init.py
import signac

project = signac.get_project()

for foo in range(3):
    project.open_job({"foo": foo}).init()

~/my_project $ python init.py

The key is using the Python project handle as the interface to initialize jobs (data points) in your data space. You can then implement a simple data space operation using signac-flow within a project.py script:

# project.py
from flow import FlowProject


@FlowProject.operation
def hello_job(job):
    print(f"Hello from job {job.id}, my foo is {job.sp.foo}.")


if __name__ == "__main__":
    FlowProject().main()

Note the use of the FlowProject.operation() decorator to indicate that the hello_job function should be interpreted as an operation acting on the data space.

Operations can be executed for all of your jobs with:

~/my_project $ python project.py run
Hello from job 15e548a2d943845b33030e68801bd125, my foo is 1.
Hello from job 7f3e901b4266f28348b38721c099d612, my foo is 0.
Hello from job 2b985fa90138327bef586f9ad87fc310, my foo is 2.
WARNING:flow.project:Operation 'hello_job' has no postconditions!

See the Tutorial for a more detailed introduction to how to use signac to manage data and implement workflows.