Installation via Conda#

Important

This is the preferred approach to install goSPL on a local machine.

Warning

For Windows users, first install Linux on Windows with WSL. This works with Windows 10 and 11.

Quick install from the `geodels` conda channel#

The simplest way to install goSPL is from the pre-built conda package published on the geodels channel on anaconda.org. This avoids building goSPL’s Fortran/Cython extensions locally and pulls every runtime dependency from conda-forge in one step.

Create a fresh environment and install gospl in one command:

mamba create -n gospl -c geodels -c conda-forge gospl

or with classic conda:

conda create -n gospl -c geodels -c conda-forge gospl

Then activate the environment:

mamba activate gospl     # or: conda activate gospl

and verify the install:

python -c "from gospl.model import Model; print('goSPL ready')"

Note

-c conda-forge is required alongside -c geodels so that petsc4py, mpi4py, pyshtools, vtk and the rest of the scientific stack resolve from conda-forge. Without it, conda falls back to the defaults channel, which does not carry compatible builds of these packages.

To install a specific version (e.g. for reproducibility):

mamba create -n gospl -c geodels -c conda-forge gospl=2026.06.11

Note

Latest released packages on the geodels channel:

Version	Date	Install command
`v2026.06.11`	2026-06-11	`mamba install -c geodels -c conda-forge gospl`
`v2026.06.08`	2026-06-08	`mamba install -c geodels -c conda-forge gospl=2026.06.08`

The two sections below cover the alternative environment.yml approach, which is useful if you want to add extra packages to the environment in the same step, work from an editable source checkout, or track the master branch between releases.

Installing Anaconda / Miniforge#

One of the simplest ways to install goSPL and its dependencies is with Anaconda or Miniforge, cross-platform (Linux, macOS, Windows) Python distributions for data analytics and scientific computing.

Note

Recommended: use Miniforge. Miniforge ships mamba (a fast drop-in replacement for conda) and defaults to the conda-forge channel, which is where all of goSPL’s dependencies live. Download from github.com/conda-forge/miniforge.

Note

For Windows users, install Anaconda or Miniforge via the WSL terminal. Several guides are available online (e.g. this one).

For other approaches, installation instructions for Anaconda can be found here.

Another advantage of installing Anaconda/Miniforge is that you don’t need admin rights — they can be installed in your home directory.

Installing Miniconda#

Warning

If you have installed Anaconda or Miniforge already, skip this section.

If you want a minimal installation, Miniconda installs only the conda package manager and a base Python environment. Download and run the installer from conda.pydata.org/miniconda.html. Windows users must run the installer from within the WSL terminal.

Building the goSPL environment#

The next step is to download the conda environment file for goSPL.

For the latest (master branch) of goSPL, download environment.yml from the repository:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Geodels/gospl/master/environment.yml --output environment.yml

or:

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Geodels/gospl/master/environment.yml

Alternatively, download it directly from your browser: environment.yml.

The current environment.yml for the goSPL runtime environment is:

name: gospl
channels:
    - conda-forge
dependencies:
    - python>=3.11,<3.13
    - meson-python>=0.15.0
    - setuptools>=61.0
    - pkg-config
    - numpy
    - petsc>=3.21,<3.22
    - petsc4py>=3.21,<3.22
    - openmpi>=4.0,<5.0
    - mpi4py>=4.0
    - scipy
    - matplotlib
    - numpy-indexed
    - pandas
    - h5py * mpi_openmpi*
    - hdf5 * mpi_openmpi*
    - vtk-base
    - ruamel.yaml
    - gflex
    - pyshtools
    - cython
    - c-compiler
    - cxx-compiler
    - fortran-compiler
    - pytest

Note

Key dependency constraints (do not remove these pins without reading the rationale):

petsc>=3.21,<3.22 and petsc4py>=3.21,<3.22: on macOS (osx-arm64) conda-forge stopped publishing openmpi-linked petsc4py builds from 3.22 onward; pinning to 3.21.x keeps the OpenMPI-linked variant that is required for correct MPI finalisation.
openmpi>=4.0,<5.0: OpenMPI 5.x fails at MPI_Init on macOS with a PML add procs failed error. Pin to the 4.x line on all platforms for consistency.
h5py * mpi_openmpi* and hdf5 * mpi_openmpi*: goSPL performs collective (parallel) HDF5 writes; the nompi variant of h5py silently fails on collective writes under MPI.
vtk-base (not vtk): the full vtk package on macOS/arm64 pulls in gtk3/gdk-pixbuf, whose post-link script fails in the conda-build sandbox. goSPL uses VTK for unstructured mesh I/O only, not rendering.
Python is pinned >=3.11,<3.13 (not a strict =3.11). A strict pin conflicts with the CI matrix override on Python 3.12 cells.

Note

pyshtools is required: the flexural-isostasy module uses a pyshtools-based spherical-harmonic implementation. meshio and pyproj are no longer required dependencies and can be removed from any existing environment file.

Note

goSPL is also available as a pre-built conda package on the geodels channel — see Quick install from the geodels conda channel above for the one-line install. The environment.yml approach is useful when you want to follow the master branch directly, work from an editable source checkout, or extend the environment with additional packages in one step.

Navigate to the directory containing environment.yml and run:

mamba env create -f environment.yml

or with classic conda:

conda env create -f environment.yml

This creates an environment with all dependencies required to run goSPL.

Activate the environment:

conda activate gospl

Install additional packages if needed:

conda install jupyter

If a package is only available via pip:

pip install <package-name>

Remove the environment:

conda remove --name gospl --all

Verify removal:

conda info --envs

Alternative goSPL installation#

To try another branch or version of goSPL, activate the environment and run:

pip install git+https://github.com/Geodels/gospl.git@NAME

where NAME is the branch name or version tag (e.g. v2026.06.11, master).

Alternatively, clone the repository and install in editable mode:

git clone https://github.com/Geodels/gospl.git
cd gospl
pip install --no-build-isolation -e .

The --no-build-isolation flag is required so that pip uses the MPI, PETSc, and compiler toolchain already present in the conda environment rather than fetching a fresh isolated build environment.

Pre- and post-processing environment (goSPL-examples)#

To run goSPL together with its pre- and post-processing workflows — the notebooks in the goSPL-examples repository — you need a fuller environment than the runtime stack above.

The next step consists in downloading the conda environment for goSPL. A conda environment is like a virtualenv that allows you to install a specific flavour of Python and a set of libraries. For the latest version (master branch) of goSPL, this is done by downloading the environment.yml file from the goSPL-examples repository. To do this you can use curl:

curl https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Geodels/goSPL-examples/master/environment.yml --output environment.yml

or the wget command:

wget https://raw.githubusercontent.com/Geodels/goSPL-examples/master/environment.yml

This will save the file locally under the same name as it was on GitHub: environment.yml.

Alternatively, you can get it from your preferred web browser by clicking on the following link: environment.yml and saving it under the name environment.yml.

While goSPL itself is available from the geodels conda channel (see Quick install from the geodels conda channel above), the examples additionally rely on pre- and post-processing libraries — some only available via pip — so the example environment is built from this environment file rather than installed as a single conda package. The use of the environment file provides an easy installation approach.

Once the environment.yml file has been downloaded on your system, the following directives provide a step-by-step guide to create a local conda environment for goSPL. Navigate to the directory containing the environment.yml file and run the following command from a terminal window:

conda env create -f environment.yml

This will create an environment with the dependencies and packages required to run goSPL-examples.

To put yourself inside this environment run:

conda activate gospl-smoke

To install other packages, jupyter for example:

conda install jupyter

After your environment has been activated, you can use either VS Code or JupyterLab to run those examples on your local computer.

Installation via Conda#

Quick install from the geodels conda channel#

Installing Anaconda / Miniforge#

Installing Miniconda#

Building the goSPL environment#

Alternative goSPL installation#

Pre- and post-processing environment (goSPL-examples)#

Quick install from the `geodels` conda channel#