Validator – a Web-Based Interactive Tool for Validation of Ocean Models at Oceanographic Stations

Abstract

Numerical ocean models, like other geoscientific models, are a strongly simplified representation of real oceans. They are used as tools to answer research questions about the real-world systems. Therefore, their thorough validation is essential to ensure that the conclusions drawn from the model experiment are valid in reality. We demonstrate a software which allows an interactive model validation through a web interface based on the R Shiny framework. At pre-defined stations, different kinds of plots can be rendered within a few seconds, according to the user’s choice, allowing a live validation of different model parameters even in model simulations which are still running. This makes it different from validation approaches which generate a pre-defined set of plots after the calculations have finished and make it particularly useful for model tuning purposes. Observation data can be read in from text files or can be extracted from a database. Once set up, the validation tool requires no technical skills to use. It can be used for single- or multi-model validation and allows saving the generated plots as high-resolution images suitable for use in scientific publications. A Linux operating system is required for the Validator app, but via a virtual machine, the software can run on Windows or MacOS hosts as well. A Dockerfile is supplied which allows to test the software with example data without installation. Funding statement: This software was developed at the Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research Warnemunde (IOW) on institutional funding.