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VMC Output Analysis

Standard Output

The standard output of a VMC run contains information about the progress of the simulation and the final results.

Energy and Variance

Look for lines containing total E or Energy to find the estimated energy.

Block    1  E = -15.8765 +/- 0.0012
...
Final Energy = -15.8760 +/- 0.0005

Blocking Analysis

CHAMP performs blocking analysis to estimate the statistical error. The output will show the error estimate as a function of block size or number of blocks.

Correlation Time

The output may also report the correlation time, which indicates how many steps are needed to generate an independent sample.

Output Files

  • mc_configs: Contains the current walker configurations.
  • mc_configs_newX: Generated if vmc_nconf_new > 0. Contains walkers saved for subsequent runs (e.g., DMC).
  • vmc.out (or similar): The main log file.

Visualization

You can use the analysis tools (see Analysis) to plot the energy trace and check for equilibration.