Wanted: Software for population dynamics modeling

[Aris Gerakis]

In bionet.biology.computational you write:

>Are there any special programming packages that were developed to fit
>these needs? I have seen a demo of Stella for the Macintosh, a program
>to simulate systems with differential equations etc. For my approach,
>I want programs that work with discrete population members rather than
>with allele frequencies.

I tried to respond via e-mail but my mailer cannot find esh.unibe.ch.  
It happens that most of the code already in existence is in FORTRAN, not a 
very good language for the Mac. I have various pieces of code that match some 
of your requirements, such as distributed delay, random # generators, 
function optimizers, etc.

A basic reference is Kuster and Mize, the title is something like simulation
programs in FORTRAN or similar.  I can look it up if you are more interested.
The book is old but bookstores can still order it.   

>speed is of course another problem here, although I've heard that you
>could transfer your programs and routines to mainframe computers after
>developing (and debugging) them on your PC/Mac.

Well, the only real portable language is FORTRAN 77, maybe ANSI C too.  Don't
expect Think C to be portable to mainframe as it is.

The Mac is also my favorite platform, but because I need to run FORTRAN code
and C I use a UNIX machine.  You can always check the possibility
of using A/UX, although it is very demanding in hardware resources (won't run
in early Macs).  I am interested in A/UX but have no capable machine yet.

Regards, 
aris gerakis
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