Installation
Dependencies
TB2J is a python package which requires python version higher than 3.6 to work. It depends on the following packages.
numpy>1.16.5
scipy
matplotlib
ase>=3.19
tqdm>=4.42.0
p_tqdm
pathos
packaging
If you use pip to intall, they will be automatically installed so there is no need to install them manually before installing TB2J.
There are some optional dependencies, which you need to install if needed.
sisl>0.10.0 (optional) for Siesta interface
GPAW (optional) For gpaw interface (not yet fully operational).
How to install
The most easy way to install TB2J is to use pip:
pip install TB2J
You can also download TB2J from the github page, and install with
python setup.py install
The –user option will help if there is permission problem.
It is suggested that it being installed within a virtual environment using e.g. pyenv or conda.
By default, TB2J only forces the non-optional dependencies to be installed automatically. The sisl package which is used to read the Hamiltonian from the Siesta or OpenMX output is needed, which can also be installed with pip. The GPAW-TB2J interface is through python directly, which of course requires the gpaw python package. The sisl and gpaw python package can be installed via pip, too. For example:
pip3 install sisl
How to install in a virtual environment
It is recommend to install TB2J in virtual enviroment (venv), which is like a world parallel to the main python environment where the other packages are installed. With this, conflictions between library versions can be avoided. For example, may be you have other packages only work with a old version of numpy, whereas TB2J requires a newer version. Then within this venv you can have the new version without needing to worry about the conflictions.
One way to build a python venv is to use venv library built in python. We can make a new python virtual environment named TB2J like this:
python3 -m venv <your path>/TB2J
where you can replace <your path> to the path where you want to put the files for the venv.
Then you can activate the venv py using
source <your path>/TB2J/bin/activate
The within this venv you can install the python packages. And this venv should be activated when you use TB2J.
There are other ways to build virtual environments, for example, with conda .