Advanced multimedia interfaces for use in engineering and educational software
J. Lindemann, O. Dahlblom and G. Sandberg
Outline
• General discussion of analysis software for civil engineers, designers and archictects
• A tool for “sketching” structures and forces.
• The “Virtual Workbench” for 3D beam analysis
Analysis software for designers and architects
• Easy to find analysis software for engineers
• Hard to find analysis software for designers or architects– Different requirements– Different uses and application
Engineering software
Engineering software
Analysis software for designers and architects
• Software must be adapted to a different work process
• Analysis must be easy to use
• Fast, adapted to an iterative process.
• Visualisation of results important
The design process
The design process
Problem Investigation Solution Evaluation
Redesign
Final solution
Painting programs
Painting programs
• Direct manipulation• Easy to use• Often used by designers/architects• Can this be applied to an analysis tool for
designers and architects?
ForcePAD
• 2D finite element analysis program
• Structure is painted• Standard paint tools,
brush, lines, geometric primitives and fill
• Visualisation of principal stresses and deformation
Example of use…
Educational use at The School of Design Sciences
First ForcePAD assignment
• Illustrate the shear stresses
Second ForcePAD assignment
• Bicycle design
Results
• Standard bicycle designs
Results
• Modified bicycle designs
Results
• New bicycle design
Educational use atStructural Mechanics
• Used in the undergraduate course in structural mechanics
Assignment 1 – Trusses
Assignment 1 - Results
Assigment 2 – Bar of different materials
Assignment 2 - Results
Assignment 3 – Concrete test sample
Assignment 3 - Results
Assignment 4 – Piece of wood
Assignment 4 - Results
Assignment 5 - Beams
Assignment 5 - Results
Creating a “virtual workshop”
• Architects often use models to evaluate their designs
• Enables them to get a better ”feel” of the designs• How can this ”workshop” be translated into
software?
New hardware possibilities
• Cheap 3d/2d acceleration– Real-time lighted and shaded models
– Transparency (Blending)
– Fast 2d operations
• Low cost computational resources– Complex analysis possible on most workstations
– Sometimes even in real-time
What can we learn from games?
• Direct interfaces
• Not bound by existing paradigms
• Visually appealing
• Often easy to use
User interface examples
Transparency
Heads up display
Direct manipulation
Dynamic
ObjectiveFrame
• 3D beam analysis
• Direct manipulation interface
• ”Feedback mode” for visualising deflection in real-time.
• Visualisation of section forces and deformation
Example of use…
Educational use at The School of Architecture at Chalmers
University of Technology
• The usability of ObjectiveFrame was tested in the course High Structures --- A Creative Investigation
Stiffening of structures
• The assignment was to apply stiffening methods to high structures
• A one-hour lecture was given to introduce different methods of stiffening high structures
• The students were given two models– A simple structure for studying the effects of
stiffening a floor
– A more complete structure for evaluating different methods of stiffening.
The models
The students
The results
Conclusions
• It is difficult to create good educational software• Paradigms can be effectively combined to create
new analysis tools• New hardware enables new ideas• ForcePAD and ObjectiveFrame have succesfully
used in the education
More information
• ForcePAD and ObjectiveFrame can be found athttp://www.byggmek.lth.se under Resources