PmagPy is a comprehensive set of tools for analyzing paleomagnetic data. It facilitates interpretation of demagnetization and Thellier-type experimental data and can create a wide variety of useful plots. It is designed to work with the MagIC database, allowing manipulation of downloaded data sets as well as preparation of new contributions for uploading to the MagIC database. It also supports the use of IPython/Jupyter notebooks for fully documented and nicely illustrated data analysis.
Complete documentation for PmagPy installation is available at: http://earthref.org/PmagPy/cookbook
To get started, download a zip file of the latest release here: https://github.com/ltauxe/PmagPy/releases/latest Click on "Source code (zip)" or "Source code (tar.gz)" to download. To install the software on a Mac or a PC, unzip the downloaded folder and double-click on the install script for your system. Linux users can just copy the contents of the folder into one in your home directory named PmagPy. Add that directory to your path.
PmagPy is comprised of:
- Command line programs for all sorts of paleomagnetic data analysis and wrangling
- GUI programs for getting data into MagIC database format (QuickMaGIC), analyzing demagnetization data (demag_gui) and analyzing paleointensity data (thellier_gui)
- A function module (ipmag.py) for utilizing PmagPy functions within an IPython/Jupyter notebook environment
- Example data files that are used in the examples provided in the PmagPy cookbook http://earthref.org/PmagPy/cookbook
Use of all these features is described in the cookbook and the underlying science behind the data and code can be explored in the book Essentials of Paleomagnetism: Third Web Edition (http://earthref.org/MAGIC/books/Tauxe/Essentials/).
The code base for the PmagPy project has been built up over many years by Lisa Tauxe (Distinguished Professor of Geophysics at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography) supported by grants from the National Science Foundation. Ron Shaar (Senior Lecturer at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Lori Jonestrask and Nick Swanson-Hysell (Assistant Professor at UC Berkeley) have also made contributions to the project.
This code and the PmagPy cookbook (http://earthref.org/PmagPy/cookbook) are companions to the the book Essentials of Paleomagnetism: Third Web Edition (http://earthref.org/MAGIC/books/Tauxe/Essentials/) written by Lisa Tauxe with contributions from Subir K. Banerjee, Robert F. Butler and Rob van der Voo. The printed version of the book came out in January, 2010 from University of California Press (http://www.ucpress.edu/book.php?isbn=9780520260313).