MetPy 2019: Building a Software Package and Community

MetPy is a Python package to perform meteorological calculations, plotting, and reading domain specific file-formats. Since its inception in 2008, MetPy has become a fast growing project with estimated thousands of monthly users. Recently the project has become supported via an NSF grant and currently has two full time developers. The focus of this presentation will be on new functionality implemented in MetPy during the 2018 development cycle and will include examples of plots, calculations, and output from MetPy.

One aspect of the funded work on MetPy is to replace the aging and unsupported package GEMPAK. Developers have added a table to help GEMPAK users find the Python equivalent of their favorite GEMPAK commands. The team has also been working to implement more of the calculations that GEMPAK performs including various forms of vorticity, inertial advective wind, Q-vector analysis, wet bulb temperature, cross-sections, and a host of other functionality.

Work in progress includes the development of an automated parameter solver, declarative style plotting interface, and enhanced calculation ability. These works will be outlined with a roadmap for the next year of MetPy development.

The final component of the presentation will focus on the community building efforts around MetPy. Essential factors in this community-building include scoping, providing training materials, creating transition paths from the use of legacy tools, and creating a welcoming environment for new contributors. These principles of community building are broadly applicable across any scientific software project and are crucial to adoption and sustainability and each will be discussed in the context of this project.