By the way, before you read this post, catch up with how we use docker by reading part 1 Docker allows us to distribute pre-built applications which are hosted in a virtual machine and are therefore platform independent.

While huge improvements in usability have been achieved in Underworld2, the installation process is still unfortunately as painful as ever. This difficulty is in large part due to Underworld's numerous dependencies, and also the multiple platforms we try to support. Compounding this, the legacy of a individual user's machine often conspires against success, rarely in obvious ways. Simply, compiling is not fun.

(aka the Underworld renovation project) Underworld [https://www.underworldcode.org/] is our parallel, particle-in-cell, finite element geodynamics code [1]. For the past year or so, the Underworld team [http://www.facebook.com/underworldcode] has been working on a refurbished user interface. We've known for a long time that it needed to be done but we finally bit the bullet.

In a recent paper [1], we used Underworld models to examine subduction congestion associated with the ingestion of a continental ribbon. The SE Australian geological record turned out to be a wonderful place to study this process. Here is a short summary of the work for a relatively non-technical audience that we put together and some additional figures which I prepared.