A self-contained script to automatically collect and save various types of information about a computing environment.

$ python getinfo.py
{
    "module[__main__]": {
        "modulefunction[meta]": {
            "version": "0.24.1.25",
            "__file__": {
                "path": "/home/user/watertap/getinfo/getinfo.py",
                "resolved": "/home/user/watertap/getinfo/getinfo.py",
                "ctime": "2024-04-09T12:08:08.013806",
                "mtime": "2024-04-09T12:08:08.013806",
                "size": 17239
            }
        },
        "modulefunction[python]": {
            "sys.executable": "/opt/conda/envs/dev-watertap-py311/bin/python",
            "which python": {
                "invoked_as": "python",
                "file": {
                    "path": "/opt/conda/envs/dev-watertap-py311/bin/python",
                    "resolved": "/opt/conda/envs/dev-watertap-py311/bin/python3.11",
                    "ctime": "2024-03-05T10:55:51.026118",
                    "mtime": "2024-03-05T10:55:47.902068",
                    "size": 24625680
                }
            },
            "sys.version_info": [
                3,
                11,
                8,
                "final",
                0
            ],
        },
        "modulefunction[platform]": {
            "locale.getlocale()": [
                "en_US",
                "UTF-8"
            ],
            "locale.getpreferredencoding()": "UTF-8",
            "platform.platform()": "Linux-5.4.0-174-generic-x86_64-with-glibc2.31",
            "platform.system()": "Linux",
            "platform.machine()": "x86_64",
            "platform.processor()": "x86_64",
            "platform.version()": "#193-Ubuntu SMP Thu Mar 7 14:29:28 UTC 2024",
            "platform.release()": "5.4.0-174-generic",
# truncated, full output is longer

The primary use case for getinfo is to make collecting, sharing, and comparing information easier while troubleshooting.

For example, when supporting a user who's reporting an issue, a WaterTAP developer/maintainer might need to ask a number of question, including:

• What version of WaterTAP are you using?
• What version of IDAES/Pyomo is installed?
• Did you install WaterTAP from PyPI? A local Git clone? A GitHub branch/fork?
• Are you using a Conda environment?
• What version of Python are you using?
• What's the path of the Python executable?
• What was the working directory when the issue occurred?
• What operating system are you using? What version?
• What processor architecture?
• What other Python packages are installed? What versions?

getinfo makes this process easier, by:

• Automating the collection of information (as opposed to the maintainer having to provide the commands to run, and the user having to run them)
• Collating the output in a standardized text format, so that e.g. outputs from different environments can be compared (or even diffed) directly

To use getinfo, no installation is necessary (or, for the time being, even supported). getinfo is designed to be as self-contained as possible: the only requirements are (a) a local copy of the getinfo.py file, and (b) a working python command.

For the sake of example, let's consider the scenario in which you encounter an issue, e.g. an unexpected failure while running WaterTAP's test suite.

1. Download getinfo.py by navigating to https://github.com/watertap-org/getinfo/blob/main/getinfo.py and clicking on the "Download raw file" button
2. Copy the path of the downloaded getinfo.py file (e.g. on Windows, this can be done by navigating to the Downloads folder, selecting the file, and clicking on "Copy Path")
3. In the same terminal/console window where the failure occurred, type python followed by the path to the downloaded getinfo.py file, e.g. python "C:\Users\user\Downloads\getinfo.py". If the terminal/console window isn't open anymore, open a new one trying to reproduce the conditions when the failure occurred (e.g. same working directory, Conda environment, etc)
4. After collecting various types of information, getinfo will save the collected data in JSON format. By default, the output is saved to a JSON file in the current working directory (the name is displayed in the logging), which can be opened with any text editor and/or attached to e.g. a GitHub issue or a Slack support message. In this particular example, inspecting the getinfo output would help an experienced developer spot an incompatibility between the installed versions of Pyomo and idaes-pse (the Pyomo version is too old)