Here are some notes on getting the WRF system up and running on a Linux box. The instructions presume you have root access to the box. You may already have NetCDF, compilers, NCAR Graphics and NCL installed. If you do, you don't need to go root.
A&OS 229/180 students: If you're using one of my Linux boxes, you won't need to do any of this. I'll give you the precompiled WRF model and WRFSI. All you need do to start out is to run the WRF test case.
Also see my WRF tutorial slides (PDF format). The nesting stuff is way out of date, and it's not updated for WPS yet..
Untar the WRF code, and rename the directory it creates from WRFV2 to WRFV212. This is so we can keep track of different versions.
Type ./configure. Look at the options. Start with the option for Intel compiler for single-threaded without nesting. MPI version requires you to have or install a multiprocessing library, such as mpich.
Type ./compile em_real. This compiles the Eulerian mass ARW core for a real data case.
If successful, you should see files called wrf.exe and real.exe in your subdirectory called main.
(4) Run a WRF test case
Create a new subdirectory in WRFV212 directory called FRANCES.
Download the file wrfv212_frances_input.tar.gz (Warning: 121MB!) into the FRANCES subdirectory. Unpack the file, revealing a file called namelist.input, and a number of files that serve as input to real.exe. These were created using WRFSI from AVN GRIB data from the 2005090112 (1 September 2005 at 12Z) run.
Download the file makelinks.csh into the FRANCES subdirectory. Use the command chmod u+x makelinks.csh to make the file executable. This file puts links to the model code and other required files into the FRANCES subdirectory.
Type ./real.exe to process the input data. This program creates input condition and boundary condition information for the WRF model. Look for the message real_em: SUCCESS COMPLETE REAL_EM INIT.
Type nohup wrf.exe > wrf.out & to run WRF. The namelist is set up to run a 54h simulation. For a shorter run, change run_hours in the namelist. Look for wrf: SUCCESS COMPLETE WRF message at the end of wrf.out.
This model run will create a file called wrfout_d01_2004-09-01_12:00:00 which contains the model output.
Replace wrfsi/src/include/makefile_pcintel.inc.in with my version of the file. My version corrects flag syntax for the Intel compiler. Look to make sure the NCARGFC variable points to the correct location for NCAR Graphics, in case you need this.
Compile WRFSI. Type ./install_wrfsi.pl --machine="pcintel".
Notes on using WRFSI
Creating a domain called frances2004...
The Hurricane Frances example used these values for the horizontal grid.
Map projection: Lambert
Standard longitude and centerpoint longitude: -72
True latitudes and centerpoint latitude: 25
Horizontal dimension 120 for X and Y
Distance between grid points: 36 km
For the vertical grid, I used 31 levels (the default) but set the model top at 10 mb. AVN/GFS, FNL and NNRP datasets extend up to 10 mb. The Eta 212 gridded product tops out at 50 mb.
For the Initial Data section, make sure Path to GRIB source is correct.
For the Interpolate Data section, make sure INIT_ROOT and LBC_ROOT reflect the initial data source (e.g., AVN).
WRFSI output files are called wrf_real_input... and are located in WRFV212/wrfsi/domains/frances2004/siprd. Move or link these to the directory we're using to run the model, WRFV212/FRANCES.