Copyright © 2003-2011 by James Q. Feng. All rights reserved.
Questions and comments should be directed to:
James Q. Feng
Phone: 1-763-315-0648
e-mail: james.q.feng@gmail.com
Version: 2.1.1.0
Release: 02/20/05
FECAW is a graphic user interface tool for multi-discipline, multi-physics finite-element computational analysis of a variety of scientific and engineering problems (e.g., electrostatics, fluid mechanics, heat transfer, electrohydrodynamics, elastic deformations of solid.) Completely written in C++ programming language with the graphic user interface implementation based on Qt (a C++ class library for GUI applications), the entire package is cross-platform portable.
Because of its cross-platform portability, FECAW is expected to run with just about any operating systems such as Unix (including Linux) on any reasonably modern PC or RISC workstation, Microsoft Windows, Macintosh, etc. The executables (that can be downloaded from this webside) are currently made available for Linux (Fedora C2) and Microsoft Windows environments.
Perspective users should be aware that FECAW is a complex system targeted towards professional scientists, engineers, and graduate students. Although some simple results can be obtained quickly by virtue of the easy-to-use GUI facility, significant effort (e.g., weeks to months) is usually required to learn the underlying physics and numerical issues involving specific boundary conditions well enough to produce original (publishable) results.
The solver (fecaw_solver) uses the Galerkin finite-element method to discretize the generally nonlinear equation system with arbitrarily shaped two-dimensional problem domain tesselated with quadrilateral elements. For steady-state cases, it transforms the nonlinear partial differential system into a set of nonlinear algebraic equations with finite degrees of freedom, which is then solved by Newton's method of iterations to obtain quadratically converged solutions. For transient cases, it yields a set of ordinary differential/algebraic equations, which is then solved implicitly by the method of lines with a predictor/corrector strategy.
The graphic user interface was implemented based on Qt (a C++ class library for GUI applications) under the guidance and inspiration of John G. Shaw . It allows the user to specify the problem parameters and to analyze the numerical solutions in a "user-friendly" environment without being bogged down by the details of computational procedures. It converts the user-specified problem parameters into input files for the fecaw_solver to compute the numerical solution, and allows the user to "postprocess" the data files of the numerical solution (as outputs from the fecaw_solver) according to the user's desire. Besides being used as a self-contained finite-element computational analysis tool, the current version of FECAW can also be used as a 2D quadrilateral element mesh generator with an output ASCII file in PLOT3D format (*.fmt). If user desires to use a fancier post-processor, the current version of FECAW post-processor is capable of exporting the relevant field variables as a Tecplot ASCII file (*.dat).
FECAW releases are identified by a name of the form FECAW-M.m.r; where M is the major version number, m is the minor version number, and r is a revision number. Although not included as part of the external identifier, a fourth digit (i.e., FECAW-M.m.r.b) is specified in the "Welcome" page signifying the build number of the release.
Major versions differ significantly from each other and involve architectural changes. The major version can be expected to change very infrequently (e.g., less than once a year).
The minor version determines whether FECAW is "stable" or "development". Even numbers represent stable versions, while odd numbers represent development versions.
For development versions, revisions mostly just involve a gradual upgrade path to the next stable release. Users should generally ignore these changes until the next stable release occurs. A new revision is generally issued for a stable release to fix an important bug! Occasionally, a new revision will provide some functional improvement or addition to the system. In the case of very minor changes, such as fixes to non-critical documentation, a new build number is assigned. So "FECAW-1.2.1.1" would be slightly newer and improved over "FECAW-1.2.1.0". Sometimes new build numbers just designate a new compile, possibly with variations of compiler options.
Meshing of arbitrary shaped 2D problem domains is facilitated with the FECAW GUI facility, by dividing a domain into quadrilateral regions with boundaries created either by click-drag-click type of mouse actions or by entering point coordinates in the dialog window.
User is allowed to adjust the quadrilateral mesh distribution by clicking on the region boundaries and changing values of stretching parameters in the pop-up window.
The 2D quadrilateral finite-element mesh generated with FECAW can be exported to an ASCII file in PLOT3D format, for usage with various numerical solvers other than FECAW.
Problem parameters and boundary conditions are entered in various dialog windows in a straightforward fashion.
The fecaw_solver is driven by clicking a button in the GUI dialog window.
Various solution analysis tools are made available, such as contour and vector plotting, tabular displaying boundary variable values, displaying information associated with a particular node by mouse clicking at a close by point, vector field tracing, etc.
The FECAW post-processor is also capable of exporting the solution field variables to a Tecplot ASCII file (*.dat) for more sophisticated analyses.
The version 2 of FECAW differ considerably from the version 1 in the problem definition data file structure. Thus, the current version of FECAW (v.2.0.1) cannot read the problem definition data file (*.problem) via Problem > Read. However, the *.boundary, *.region, *.mesh remain the same and are still usable. If a FECAW user of version 1 wants to use some of the version 1 files, he/she can still read in the *.boundary (via Boundary > Read), *.region (via Region > Read), and *.mesh (via Mesh > Read) files individually (instead of going File > Open) and then start the Problem section to set problem parameters from scratch. After completed the Problem section, user need to save the files by going to File > Save.
The following documents provide instructions related to installing and using FECAW. The beginers are recommended to read the FECAW Users Guide and work through its Tutorials section. Once familiar with the basics of FECAW, the users are encouraged to read (at least selectively) some of the Examples documentation, to improve the effectiveness of usage of FECAW's variety of features. The mathematical formulation and numerical method of solution can be found in several publications (cf. Refs).
FECAW for MS/Windows is available for download. To do so, you can left-click the download tab of the attached FECAW-SETUP.zip (if using Internet Explorer, for example) on james.q.feng home page or follow the instructions therein. After download the setup file, you should copy the FECAW folder from the *.zip file to setup FECAW. You can also contact James Feng james.q.feng@gmail.com (or obtain a copy from "https://sourceforge.sequensys.dnsalias.com" once setting up a FECAW user account by contacting Michel Jullian mj@exbang.com).
Last updated on: 25 April 2011