Python and Open Science Technologies

Vaclav (Vashek) Petras

NCSU GeoForAll Lab at the Center for Geospatial Analytics
North Carolina State University

GIS 710: Geospatial Analytics for Grand Challenges
November 10, 2025

https://bit.ly/2oR9owy

Learning Objectives

• bits and pieces needed for re-running code
• overview of concrete technologies for computational reproducibility
• hands-on practice with some of these technologies (Python, Jupyter, Binder)

Code: Python

• readable syntax, close to ad-hoc pseudo-code
• scripting, interpreted
• general purpose
• open source implementations
• alternatives for data science:
  • R
  • Julia
  • Matlab (proprietary), GNU Octave (open source)

Interaction: Jupyter

• Julia, Python, R (and many others)
• JupyterLab, Jupyter Notebooks, IPython
• combination of text, images, computational results, code, ...
• alternatives:
  • RStudio, R Markdown
  • Quarto
  • other notebooks and literate programming tools

Jupyter Notebook with GRASS GIS

Code Management: Git and GitHub

• GitHub is something else than Git!
• Git is a version-control system.
• GitHub is a service providing Git repository hosting and related services.
• Git is open source. GitHub is proprietary, freemium service.
• Alternatives:
  • Mercurial, Bazaar, Fossil, Subversion, ...
  • GitLab, Bitbucket, ...

Running and Sharing: Binder

• mybinder.org
• Service turning (Git) repositories and (ZIP) archives into computational environments
• Jupyter Notebooks, JupyterLab, RStudio, RShiny, Jupyter Appmode, presentation slides, ...

Binder Alternatives

• Code Ocean (Jupyter, RStudio, preservation)
• CoCalc (Jupyter, ..., desktop applications)
• RStudio Cloud (R focused)
• Google Colab (Jupyter Notebooks, Google Cloud Platform)
  • Good for collaboration, interaction with EE, but not for open science.
  • Requires sign in, notebook can access your Google Drive and credentials.
  • Setup of the environment is part of the notebook.
• The Whole Tale (funded by NSF)
• HydroShare (by CUAHSI, funded by NSF)
• Pangeo (funded by NSF, NASA, ...)
• ...

Why Binder?

• Community and long term project (Project Jupyter at NumFOCUS and cloud providers)
• Python, R, ...
• Similar concepts to RStudio Cloud, Code Ocean, ...
• Open source (building blocks of Binder: JupyterHub, BinderHub, repo2docker)
  • More than one instance exists
• Connects to Git, GitHub, GitLab, Zenodo, figshare, HydroShare, ...
• No account needed to view, edit, and run

Computational Environment: Docker

• “virtualization” tool to wrap software with all its dependencies into one package
• image is the software or binary, container is what is running
• enables to run many isolated computational environments
• open source software and related freemium platform
• alternatives:
  • virtual machines (local or in the cloud)
  • Vagrant (configuration like Docker, but for virtual machines)
  • Singularity (similar to Docker, but for HPC clusters)
  • ...

Computational Environment: Specifications

FROM ubuntu:22.04
RUN apt-get update
RUN apt-get install -y \
        g++ \
        python \
        python-numpy

pyunpack
GDAL==3.0.1

Summary

• GitHub hosts Git repositories and allows editing the content.
• Binder uses Docker to create the customized computational environments.
• People use JupyterLab to run and edit scripts and Jupyter Notebooks.

Hands-on