Clone the Code from GitHub

The Force Field X project is hosted at Github.

To clone the Force Field X source using GIT:

git clone https://github.com/SchniedersLab/forcefieldx.git ffx

In the future, your clone of Force Field X can be updated to the latest version using the command:

git pull origin master

The current status of the GitHub code:

Build Using Maven

A Maven project file (pom.xml) is provided to build Force Field X on any platform. After cloing the Force Field X git repository, change directories into the base project directory. Then execute:

mvn

This requires Maven v. 3.8 or later to be installed with its bin directory included in your $PATH environment variable. The first time this command is executed, Maven will download build dependencies and Force Field X runtime dependencies. Future executions are quicker. Force Field X will self-test its modules and report failures. Only code that passes all testing should be pushed to the GitHub repository, so if any test fails it may be due to a local configuration issue. To execute the tests:

mvn -DskipTests=false

Once the Maven build succeeds, Force Field X can be executed using platform dependent start-up scripts located in the bin. On Mac OS X or Linux:

bin/ffxc energy examples/alamet.xyz

On Windows:

bin/ffxc.bat energy examples/alamet.xyz

The ffx/bin directory should be appended to your $PATH environment variable. The "energy" command refers to an internal version of the energy.ffx script that can be found in the ffx/scripts directory.

Development Tools

Below are links to tools and dependencies relied upon for development.

Link	Description	Version
Java SE Development Kit (JDK)	Java Platform, Standard Edition (Java SE) lets you develop and deploy Java applications on desktops and servers, as well as in today's demanding embedded environments. Java offers the rich user interface, performance, versatility, portability, and security that today’s applications require.	21 or later.
Maven	Apache Maven is a software project management and comprehension tool. Based on the concept of a project object model (POM), Maven can manage a project's build, reporting and documentation from a central piece of information.	3.8 or later.
	YourKit supports the Force Field X open source project with its full-featured Java Profiler. YourKit, LLC is the creator of innovative and intelligent tools for profiling Java and .NET applications.	2018
GIT Version Control	Git is a free and open source, distributed version control system designed to handle everything from small to very large projects with speed and efficiency.	2.3 or later.