Creating Model Programs

Target audience: Developers

PROOF provides the user with predefined Block Templates that can be used to create Blocks in Workflows. If a user wants to implement a specific functionality or model that is not covered by the existing Block Templates, it is possible to create new Block Templates.

This page describes how to create custom Model Programs that are required to build a new Block Template in PROOF.

What is a Model Program?

A Model Program is an executable file (such as a Python script, Java program, or MATLAB script) that contains the logic to be executed by a Block in PROOF.

Since the current version of the PROOF Docker containers use Python as programming language for Model Programs, the following documentation refers to Python specifically. The extension to other programming languages (Java, MATLAB) will be provided in future releases of PROOF (2026).

A Model Program must be able to run independently and perform the required computations to ensure it works as expected when integrated into a Block within a Workflow.

Python Implementation Requirements

The Model Program must be implemented as a subclass of the proofcore.base.basewrapper.BaseWrapper class and must implement (override) the required methods:

  • init(): Initialization method called once at the start
  • step(): Execution method called for each simulation step
  • finalize(): Termination method called at the end

Template Script

To ease the generation of new Model Programs, a template Python script is provided in the PROOF GitHub repository proof-sim-core under proofcore/templates/WrapperTemplate.py. This template includes:

  • Skeleton structure with all required methods
  • Example input/output handling
  • Proper initialization and cleanup patterns
  • Best practices for PROOF integration

Next Steps

Once you have developed your Model Program:

  1. Test the Model Program independently to ensure it works correctly outside of PROOF
  2. Create a Block Template using the PROOF UI to integrate your Model Program into workflows

For detailed instructions on creating Block Templates in the PROOF UI, including: - Creating Attachments (including your Model Program) - Creating Program entities - Defining Template metadata, inputs, and outputs

See the complete guide: Creating new Block Templates