What's new in RunGTAP

This edition of RunGTAP contains a variety of improvements over the previous editions. If you have used RunGTAP before, you should be aware of these changes:

•[added May 2014] The SaveSims folder now contains an EXP file, generated at solve time from the contents of the Closure, Shocks and Solve pages.

•[added May 2014] 64-bit EXE files will not run under 32-bit Windows -- now RunGTAP attempts to warn you of this issue. See 64-bit EXE files will not run under 32-bit Windows.

•[added May 2012] Now works better if you press the "Stop" button while running a simulation.

•[added Sep 2010] Major changes and improvements have been made for made for Systematic Sensitivity Analysis (SSA)

•You can load SSA details from a file and save SSA details to a file.

•You can edit lines in the SSA Details memo.

•Each time you carry out SSA, the software prepares an SSA Summary Report CSV file. This CSV file gives considerable detail as to how the relevant shocks or parameters were varied. You can ask the software to do several SSA calculations concurrently. If you have a machine with say 3 free processors and you ask to do 3 SSA calculations concurrently, this should reduce the total time taken for your SSA calculations by about 67%.

•For more details, please see the SSA Help file which you can access via menu item Help on Systematic Sensitivity Analysis under the Tools Menu.

•[added Dec 2009] View menu now lets you edit the CMFSTART file and online help about CMFSTART has been expanded.

•[added Dec 2009] View menu now lets you view the solution file using ViewHAR. Unlike in ViewSOL, you can see values for variables with 4 or more dimensions. See ViewHAR online help topics Whats New or Opening SL4 solution files for more details.

•[added May 2007] Previously, RunGTAP imposed a time limit on simulations. This has been removed because, with 64-bit Windows it becomes feasible to solve very large versions of GTAP which might take hours.

•[added Dec 2006] New location for the temporary workfiles created by RunGTAP and the Windows programs that come with it. Hopefully this will end the TEMP problems experienced by a few people in the past. See Work folder.

•[added Dec 2006] New location for the INI file that stores your RunGTAP settings. Now, if you have several copies of RunGTAP, each has its own INI file -- previously all shared one INI file, sometimes leading to problems. See INI file location.

•[added Nov 2006]: Preparing for Windows Vista: new online help engine and adjustments to fonts.

•[added Sept 2006]: Form positioning adjusted to be more friendly to users of 2 monitors.

•[added June 2006]: Developer...Check Versions now warns if HAR or EXE files are of the older, LF90, type.

•[added June 2006] Note about ONEGTAP.

•[added June 2006] Note about Using several different copies of RunGTAP.

•[added June 2006] Note about OPTIONS.INI file.

•[added June 2006] Note about Using parallel processing.

•[added Jan 2006] Note about Reading large numbers of shocks from a SHK or HAR file.

•[added Sep 2003] Each time you successfully run an experiment, RunGTAP stores the SL4 and some other files in a subdirectory of the current version folder called SAVESIMS.

•[added Jan 2002] Modified the Accuracy Summary display.

•[added May 2001] The Help..About window now has a Diagnostics button which lists certain details of your system. If you have a problem with RunGTAP, you should certainly include this information with your error report: it might help track down the problem.

•[added May 2001] The View.Subsets and Variables dialog lets you copy data to a spreadsheet. And it shows coefficients.

•Ability to use different variants of the GTAP model which you or others may have developed. See Changing the economics of RunGTAP -- Overview.

•Ability to use TABLO programs compiled for GEMSIM -- assuming the user has installed GEMSIM. See Changing the economics of RunGTAP -- Overview.

•Version 5 of the GTAP model and database introduced a new data format. See New Data Format for GTAP Version 5. RunGTAP attempts to detect data in the old GTAP 4 format and to convert it automatically to the new format.

•Subtotals results can be calculated and shown.

•You can choose to use TABmate (or another editor) as your text editor.

•GEMPACK licencees can bring together model, results, and data with AnalyseGE.

•More flexibility in specifying the closure (swap and endogenous statements are now allowed)

•Additions to Options dialog.

•Tutorial document Ho2K.doc gives detailed introduction to using RunGTAP.

•Help item listing errors to avoid: see RunGTAP Don'ts.

•New edition of standard GTAP model with better treatment of margins means closures designed for previous editions must be updated. See New Closure for GTAP version 5.

•Buttons for loading and saving files of closures and shock statements have been removed to encourage users to instead use experiment (EXP) files to manage experiments. However these commands are still available from the Tools menu (if you are on the Closure or Shocks page).

•You can look at results with ViewSOL (but there are some limitations).