A large number of tools are included in GAMS distribution. Below are a functional categorization of all tools, an alphabetically sorted list of all tools, and a brief description of each tool with their Supported Platforms.

Note

Traditionally, GAMS tools consisted of a collection of executables with a file (mostly GDX) interface. These tool executables will be replaced over time by GAMS Connect agents and a collection of tools in a new GAMS tools library. For some time both ways will be supported but the executable tools will go away, so when in doubt what tool to pick, select Connect or a GAMS tool.

Tools Category

All tools included in GAMS distribution are categorized as

GAMS Integrated Development Environments

There are two integrated model development environments including a general text editor with the ability to launch and monitor the compilation and execution of GAMS models: GAMS Studio and the GAMS IDE (deprecated).

GAMS Tools Library

In the GAMS Tools Library, various tools are collected to provide an easy access to complex task. The tools in this library complement facilities of GAMS Connect and tools available as executables (e.g. GDXXRW). Currently the library includes the following tool categories:

Algorithmic tools (alg)

Provide algorithmic functionality like sorting data: Rank.

Data tools (data)

Provide access to external data sources: ExcelDump, CSVRead and SqliteWrite.

GDX Service (gdxservice)

Provide functionality for GDX file manipulation: GDXEncoding and GDXRename.

Linear Algebra (linalg)

Provide functionality for computational linear algebra: Cholesky, Eigenvalue, Eigenvector, Invert and Ordinary Least Squares (OLS).

Windows Only Tools (win32)

Provide functionality specific to the Windows operating system: ShellExecute, MSAppAvail, ExcelTalk and ExcelMerge.

There are a couple of things to note:

• A tool can be invoked directly in the model code during compile ($callTool) or execution time (executeTool) or by using the standalone command line utility gamstool.
• When invoked from the model code the exchange of GAMS symbols is done in memory. If a tool is called from the command line, this is not possible and hence for some tools that deal with GAMS symbols it is necessary to specify GDX input and/or output files. Even for use inside GAMS models the GDX file interface can be useful (e.g. for debugging) hence the specification of GDX input/output files is optional in that case.
• Similar to the $call (compile time) and execute (execution time) commands, a GAMS tool returns a shell code that can be checked via errorLevel. In case one expects the tools to perform without error, it is recommended to add the suffix .checkErrorLevel. This will stop the entire execution of GAMS if an error occurs while executing the tool.
• If a tool of the GAMS Tool library is used at execution time to populate a GAMS symbol with data for the first time, the compiler does not know the outcome of the tool. As a result, the compiler does not have information about any symbols that might be filled with data, and therefore cannot reliably define these symbols at compile time. Code that later on references a corresponding symbol would result in a compilation error 141: Symbol declared but no values have been assigned. In order to be able to load symbols implicitly during execution time, the dollar control option $onImplicitAssign needs to be set. There are other methods to convince the compiler that the symbols has been defined, e.g. execute_load$0 symName; which is otherwise a no-op.
• The compile time variant of a tool ($callTool [...]) is ignored while $onExternalInput is active and IDCGDXInput is set.
• Tool arguments: All tools follow the same logic to process arguments. The list of arguments starts with a number of positional arguments followed by named argument [-]name=val.
• For each tool there is a short and a long help available. If a tool is called without arguments or with -h , a short description is displayed, e.g. gamstool linalg.eigenvector -h. With the argument --help a detailed help text appears: gamstool linalg.eigenvector --help. If only the category and not a contained tool is requested, the help text of all included tools will be displayed: gamstool linalg or gamstool linalg --help.

For more information please refer to the individual tool manuals.

Command Line Utility gamstool

The GAMS system directory contains the utility gamstool to run GAMS Tool instructions directly from the command line. On Windows the utility has the callable extension .cmd which does not need to part of the command because the shell automatically checks for the extension. This script wraps the Python script tooldriver.py by calling the Python interpreter that ships with GAMS. gamstool is called like this:

gamstool [toolCategory.]toolName positionalArguments [namedArguments]

Data Exchange

A collection of tools that provide functionality to exchange data between GAMS and other data sources. This category contains tools for popular data sources and high-level programming environment and like databases (GDX2ACCESS, SqliteWrite, MDB2GMS, SQL2GMS). There are also tools for specialized systems like SqliteWrite, MDB2GMS, and SQL2GMS. There are also tools for specialized systems like VEDA (GDX2VEDA).

Excel

A collection of tools that provide functionality to exchange data between GAMS and Excel. The tools in this category are GDX2XLS, GDXXRW, XLS2GMS, ExcelDump. Many of the tools described here use the GAMS Data eXchange facility GAMS Data eXchange (GDX). Note that the executable tools in this category will be or have been replaced over time by GAMS Connect agents and tools from the GAMS Tools Library.

GDX Service

A collection of tools that operate directly on GAMS Data eXchange (GDX) containers to e.g. compare (GDXDIFF), copy (GDXCOPY), merge (GDXMERGE), label rename (GDXRename) and encoding (GDXEncoding).

LibInclude Tools Library

In the LibInclude Tools Library, various tools are collected to provide an easy access to complex task. The tools are located in the inclib folder in the GAMS system directory and can be invoked using the $libInclude command.

Note

The default library include directory inclib can be changed with the libIncDir command line parameter. Hence, make sure you point to the correct directory when using $libInclude.

Usage:

$libInclude <library_file> [<tool_name>] [<option(s)>]

Currently the library includes the following tools:

Libinclude file	Description
moo	Provides methods for multi-objective optimization in GAMS.
pyEmbMI	Provide access to a model instance that can be modified and resolved without regenerating the model over and over.
rank	Routine for ranking one-dimensional numeric data. Unlike the GAMS tool alg.rank, rank can handle percentile levels.
scenred	ScenRed is a tool for the reduction of scenarios and scenario tree construction modeling the random data processes of a stochastic program. From Humboldt-University Berlin.

Other Tools

A collection of more exotic tools that can become handy in some some special circumstances. The tools in this category are ASK, ENDECRYPT, FINDTHISGAMS, GAMS Posix Utilities, MODEL2TEX, MessageReceiverWindow, and all tools from Windows Only Tools (win32). Most notably, the collection contains the tool MODEL2TEX to document the model algebra in LaTeX format.

List of Tools

The following tables give alphabetically sorted lists of all available tools. The tables are organized into executable tools, GAMS tools and libInclude tools.

Supported Platforms

* Note that the tool is 32 bit but runs fine on 64 bit Windows.
** awk, cat, cksum, cmp, comm, cp, cut, diff, expr, fold, gdate, grep, gsort, gunzip, gzip, head, join, make, mkdir, mv, od, paste, printf, rm, sed, sleep, tail, tar, tee, test, touch, tr, uniq, wc, xargs