Installing the code on Linux or macOS

Installing the NNPDF code requires a system with a recent version of python and either a Linux-based operating system or macOS. The code can be installed either with conda or with pip, the former offering a “batteries included” approach where non-python software such as LHAPDF and pandoc will be installed automatically. We also made available an automatic installation of conda, see Installation using the bootstrap script to install conda as well as set up relevant channels.

If you plan to contribute to the development of NNPDF, please see Development installation on Linux or macOS.

Installation using conda

It is possible to install the most recent release of nnpdf as well as its dependencies by running the following command:

conda create -n environment_nnpdf nnpdf -c conda-forge -c https://packages.nnpdf.science/public [--override-channels]
conda activate environment_nnpdf

This will create a new conda environment environment_nnpdf in which the conda package for nnpdf, downloaded from our public repository, will be installed. You are now ready to use the NNPDF code! Check out the Tutorials.

Note

Make sure to be using a recent version of conda. These instructions have been tested with conda 25.

Installation using pip

Most NNPDF packages and its dependencies are available in the PyPI repository. While the fitting code is currently not available, it can be installed directly from the git repository:

python -m venv environment_nnpdf
. environment_nnpdf/bin/activate
python -m pip install git+https://github.com/NNPDF/nnpdf.git@4.0.10

Warning

When you install using pip, non-python codes such as LHAPDF and pandoc won’t be installed automatically and neeed to be manually installed in the environment. If using python 3.9, make sure it is newer than 3.9.2 (see issue here)

Installation using the bootstrap script

If you don’t have a recent version of conda installed, a helper script exists to aid the configuration using conda. To obtain it use:

mkdir nnpdfgit
cd nnpdfgit
git clone git@github.com:NNPDF/binary-bootstrap.git

Execute the script
```
./binary-bootstrap/bootstrap.sh
```
Path: the conda installer will ask to add the conda bin path to the default $PATH environment variable (by editing your .bashrc file). Confirm this unless you know that you have a specific reason not to. Note that newer versions of conda give the option of having conda available, but not any environment (which you have to enable explicitly by either having conda activate in .bashrc or typing it each time you want to use the environment). On remote machines, the addition to .bashrc should read as follows
```
if shopt -q login_shell; then
    . <path-to-conda>/etc/profile.d/conda.sh
    conda activate
fi
```

the if condition is important because conda activate prints to the standard output, which interferes with commands like scp and rsync.

Note that the script may ask you to perform some actions manually ( e.g. it will not overwrite your existing conda configuration). Please pay attention to the output text of the script.

Installing the NNPDF code

After the helper script has run, navigate to the miniconda3 installation directory, by default this is ~/miniconda3, and run the command

. ./etc/profile.d/conda.sh
conda activate
conda install nnpdf

Note: The installer will set up its own version of the LHAPDF code, with its own path for storing PDFs, which can be seen running lhapdf --help. If you have an existing directory with LHAPDF grids, you may want to either move, symlink or copy them to the new path (depending on whether you want to keep around the older installation). The command for symlinking would be something like:

ln -s <old path>/share/LHAPDF/* <new path>/miniconda3/share/LHAPDF

This will avoid symlinking the existing LHAPDF configuration, which may be corrupted or incompatible. You should make sure only the grid directories are transferred if you copy or move instead.

Using the code with docker

We provide docker images for tag release of the code using GitHub Packages. The docker images contain a pre-configured linux environment with the NNPDF framework installed with the specific tag version. The code is installed using miniconda3.

Please refer to the download and authentication instructions from the NNPDF GitHub Packages.

In order to start the docker image in interactive mode please use docker standard syntax, for example:

docker run -it ghcr.io/nnpdf/nnpdf:<tag_version> bash

This will open a bash shell with the nnpdf environment already activated, with all binaries and scripts from the NNPDF framework.