> And epanet-js is a tool that you can run in a browser - full simulations with a WASM-based engine. It’s competing with expensive old-school software that costs $16,000 a year, runs exclusively on Windows, is priced by “pipes”, and uses the same engine, EPANET. This is so much better in comparison. A radical improvement.
I have absolutely no use for epanet-js, but this is so cool. Exactly what free software is supposed to do.
I was under the impression that municipalities use GIS systems to contain "everything" (sewers, water and gas pipes, and the electricity,telephone,fiber cables etc)
Is that just a pipe dream (no pun intended) or do those lack the simulation part ?
What's the business plan ?
Why don't make it like 20$ a month ?
Are your working in a company that needs this 16000$ software, so they are just happy to cut the fees and don't care about making it opensource ?
Currently the two largest vendors of hydraulic modelling software are Autodesk and Bentley. Both have taken the EPANET engine and created private forks in the 90s/2000s and never contributed back.
The commercial tools have made it easier for engineers at consultancies and utilities to build hydraulic models by integrating GIS and providing support for scenarios to compare different states of the model or future developments of a city.
Though as Tom points out, this comes at a huge price.
The US EPA does offer a simple GUI which can be used for smaller systems but without a connection to GIS, its usage has been limited.
These commercial versions have become enterprise monsters, they are very complex and expensive.
We wanted to create the right balance between what the US EPA already gives away for free and what the big vendors offer. We believe that releasing the software as FSL which transitions to MIT gives us the right head start and for the advanced features we're charging about 10% of what Autodesk and Bentley do - and for those that think that's too much, they of course can download and host their own private version too.
For those that are still curious, here are some extra links and context.
Do you expose an api to set and get network information like valve placement, demand at nodes or pump schedules?
In my old research group we ran a forked versions of epanet to do some of these things and there was a previous effort called oompnet that tried to bring oo into working with epanet.
If researchers can use epanet-js to give their researched algos and methods for wdn control or management, the combination could actually give Bentley a run for their money.
You might want to present this at ewri and ewra or ccwi, there are usually quite a few people working with epanet there.
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I have absolutely no use for epanet-js, but this is so cool. Exactly what free software is supposed to do.
One thing I don't understand though is the license.
> Fully open source (MIT) after two years under our Functional Source License (FSL).
What exactly does this mean?
Does the simulation also work on a smaller scale?
That said, if I had a garden with a big fountain I absolutely would try to model it in EPANET ;)
Just how fancy is your irrigation system?
The commercial tools have made it easier for engineers at consultancies and utilities to build hydraulic models by integrating GIS and providing support for scenarios to compare different states of the model or future developments of a city.
Though as Tom points out, this comes at a huge price.
The US EPA does offer a simple GUI which can be used for smaller systems but without a connection to GIS, its usage has been limited.
These commercial versions have become enterprise monsters, they are very complex and expensive.
We wanted to create the right balance between what the US EPA already gives away for free and what the big vendors offer. We believe that releasing the software as FSL which transitions to MIT gives us the right head start and for the advanced features we're charging about 10% of what Autodesk and Bentley do - and for those that think that's too much, they of course can download and host their own private version too.
For those that are still curious, here are some extra links and context.
https://app.epanetjs.com/ – Try the app, it's local first and registration optional
https://github.com/epanet-js/epanet-js – Here is all the source code
https://github.com/epanet-js/epanet-js-toolkit – See how we converted the C engine to WASM
https://epanetjs.com/ – Read a landing page to see what we're doing and why, also our pricing
https://www.autodesk.com/products/infowater-pro/overview – Autodesk's product $10k/yr/user
https://en.virtuosity.com/openflows-water – Bentley's product $16k/yr/user
Do you expose an api to set and get network information like valve placement, demand at nodes or pump schedules?
In my old research group we ran a forked versions of epanet to do some of these things and there was a previous effort called oompnet that tried to bring oo into working with epanet.
If researchers can use epanet-js to give their researched algos and methods for wdn control or management, the combination could actually give Bentley a run for their money.
You might want to present this at ewri and ewra or ccwi, there are usually quite a few people working with epanet there.