December 14, 2020

GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module Online Course, Excerpt #5: Chemical Processes Controlling Mass Transport

Posted by Rick Kossik

This is the fifth installment of short excerpts from the online CT Course that is currently under development. These excerpts are all, by necessity, from the conceptual parts of the Course, as those parts that are "hands-on" don't necessarily work well in a blog format.  However, there is plenty of conceptual matter to discuss (the Course is very detailed and extensive), so I'm hoping you will still find these excerpts useful. 

The first excerpt simply provided the outline describing how the Course will be organized.  The second excerpt  discussed the key decisions required before starting to build a contaminant transport model. The third excerpt discussed the problem of uncertainty in contaminant transport models and the underlying philosophy of the GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module. The fourth excerpt provided an overview of the physical processes controlling mass transport (advection, dispersion and diffusion).

This excerpt provides an overview of the chemical processes controlling fate and transport.

November 13, 2020

GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module Online Course, Excerpt #4: Physical Processes Controlling Mass Transport

Posted by Rick Kossik

As I noted in previous blog posts, I am currently working on an online CT Course. In order to provide some useful material for users in the meantime, I plan to post excerpts from time to time as I slowly progress through the development of the Course.  

The first excerpt simply provided the outline describing how the Course will be organized.  The second excerpt  discussed the key decisions required before starting to build a contaminant transport model. The third excerpt discussed the problem of uncertainty in contaminant transport models and the underlying philosophy of the GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module. 

This excerpt finally starts to get a bit more technical, and provides an overview of the physical processes controlling mass transport (advection, dispersion and diffusion).

October 5, 2020

GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module Online Course, Excerpt #3: The GoldSim Contaminant Transport Modeling Philosophy

 Posted by Rick Kossik

As I noted in previous blog posts, I am currently working on an online CT Course. In order to provide some useful material for users in the meantime, I plan to post excerpts from time to time as I slowly progress through the development of the Course.  

The first excerpt simply provided the outline describing how the Course will be organized.  The second excerpt  discussed the key decisions required before starting to build a contaminant transport model. In this excerpt from one of the introductory Units of the Course, I discuss the problem of uncertainty in contaminant transport models and then summarize the underlying philosophy of the GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module.

September 3, 2020

GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module Online Course, Excerpt #2: Key Decisions Required Before Starting to Build a Contaminant Transport Model

 Posted by Rick Kossik

As I noted in my previous blog post, I am currently working on an online CT Course. This will be a long-term project (I'm hoping to finish by the end of the year).  But in order to provide some useful material for users in the meantime, I plan to post excerpts from time to time as I slowly progress through the development of the Course.  A blog is not the best venue for presenting the entire Course (even in parts), but I think it will be possible to provide a number of short excerpts that could be of value.

The first excerpt simply provided the outline describing how the Course will be organized.  In this excerpt, I present some information from a preliminary Lesson discussing the key decisions required before starting to build a contaminant transport model.

August 7, 2020

Navigation Tabs in the Dashboard

Posted by: Jason Lillywhite

If you want to add navigation tabs to a dashboard, you will need to create multiple dashboards with graphical components that align in order to give the impression that you are switching tabs instead of switching entire dashboard pages. Luckily, with a few simple steps, this is quite easy to do. Follow these basic steps to quickly create your navigation tabs for your dashboard.

We will be using Microsoft Power Point to draw the Navigation graphics for the Dashboard.

July 2, 2020

GoldSim Contaminant Transport Module Online Course, Excerpt #1: Course Outline

Posted by Rick Kossik
As many of you may know, several years ago, we posted our free online GoldSim Course.  This Course has been tremendously popular, with almost 900 registered users (and an uncounted number of users who took the Course without registering - registration is optional). The Course, however, only covers the basic GoldSim framework, and does not discuss any of the specialized modules.  Many people have expressed interest in a Course on the Contaminant Transport (CT) Module, but we have never had the time to put one together.  Creating effective online Courses is tremendously time-consuming: the basic Course took at almost a man-year to complete.

However, one advantage of the pandemic we are living through is that it actually provides an opportunity to work on some of the things we have not had time for.  In my case, it has provided an opportunity for me to spend some time on the CT Course. This will be a long-term project (I'm hoping to finish by the end of the year).  But in order to provide some useful material for users in the meantime, I plan to post excerpts from time to time as I slowly progress through the development of the Course.  A blog is not the best venue for presenting the entire Course (even in parts), but I think it will be possible to provide a number of short excerpts that could be of value.

So far, I have developed a very detailed outline and have completed the first 3 Units (out of 15). In the first excerpt, I simply provide the outline describing how the Course will be organized.  Note, of course, that things may change slightly as the Course continues to unfold!  Hopefully, this will get you excited about what is to come.


February 28, 2020

Combining a Weather Forecast with a Stochastic Weather Generator

Posted by Jason Lillywhite

A couple of years ago, I blogged about the application of the GoldSim WGEN model for producing probabilistic time histories of precipitation and temperature data. WGEN is useful for modeling natural systems impacted by uncertain climate influences. This model can also be used for simulating future scenarios and forecasting.

Even though the results of a WGEN model are probabilistic and uncertain, they are based on historical observed records and tied to the latitude of the earth. This allows us to produce realistic future simulations. But if you plan to use WGEN for short-term forecasting (less than 6 months), it might be helpful to incorporate a weather forecast for the first part of the simulation. Read more to see how a web service forecast model is combined with WGEN to produce a more reasonable forecast for a specific location without having to manually download the forecast.

January 24, 2020

Recommendations for Creating a GoldSim Style Guide

Posted by Jason Lillywhite

If you are interested in developing a style guide for your modeling team or organization, have a look at our new document called "Recommendations for Creating a GoldSim Style Guide." This guide is intended to help our users develop a consistent set of conventions, organization, and documentation of a GoldSim model.