NorESM setup on betzy needs updated git version

[Heiko Goelzer]

The NorESM 2.5 setup (checkout of externals) does not work correctly with the standard git version on betzy.

The standard git version on betzy is currently
git --version
git version 1.8.3.1

A workaround is to load an updated git module
module load git/2.38.1-GCCcore-12.2.0-nodocs
git --version
git version 2.38.1

It may be useful to define and recommend a common module environment that users can load.

[Tomas Torsvik]

@hgoelzer - thanks for notifying about this issue. Version 1.8.3 is more than 10 years old at this point. I will contact Sigma2 and ask if they plan to update the default version at some point. The default version on Fram is 2.33.0, so that has been updated fairly recently. If there will not be any update we should we should notify users somewhere (not sure where would be best). But in general, I hope we can avoid making recommendations about specific module settings, as this such information can easily become outdated if we don't check in on available modules from time to time.

[Heiko Goelzer]

Thanks. Updating git on the machines we use for NorESM seems like a must. It is a bit surprising that it can be so outdated.
The point of my suggestion for a common environment was to make sure that any user who is less involved in the development (that was me in this case) can be updated to the knowledge of people that are more involved (Mariana in this case). I think the problem that the environment can be outdated is exactly what we need to address. It should be clear to a user what environment is known to work with a specific version of the model.

[Tomas Torsvik]

Update from Sigma2:

Betzy will soon have its operating system upgraded. When that happens, the OS version
of git will also be updated. However, until then you may be able to use one of the versions
of git that are installed as a module on Betzy:

$ module avail git

I think we can wait for the OS update and see if the issue goes away after defautl git is updated.