Advanced multimedia interfaces for use in engineering and educational software

1. Advanced multimedia interfaces for use in engineering and educational software J. Lindemann, O. Dahlblom and G. Sandberg

2. 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

3. 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

4. Engineering software

5. Engineering software

6. 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

7. The design process

8. Redesign Problem Investigation Solution Evaluation Final solution The design process

9. Painting programs

10. Painting programs • Direct manipulation • Easy to use • Often used by designers/architects • Can this be applied to an analysis tool for designers and architects?

11. ForcePAD • 2D finite element analysis program • Structure is painted • Standard paint tools, brush, lines, geometric primitives and fill • Visualisation of principal stresses and deformation

12. Example of use…

13. Educational use at The School of Design Sciences

14. First ForcePAD assignment • Illustrate the shear stresses

15. Second ForcePAD assignment • Bicycle design

16. Results • Standard bicycle designs

17. Results • Modified bicycle designs

18. Results • New bicycle design

19. Educational use atStructural Mechanics • Used in the undergraduate course in structural mechanics

20. Assignment 1 – Trusses

21. Assignment 1 - Results

22. Assigment 2 – Bar of different materials

23. Assignment 2 - Results

24. Assignment 3 – Concrete test sample

25. Assignment 3 - Results

26. Assignment 4 – Piece of wood

27. Assignment 4 - Results

28. Assignment 5 - Beams

29. Assignment 5 - Results

30. 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?

31. 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

32. What can we learn from games? • Direct interfaces • Not bound by existing paradigms • Visually appealing • Often easy to use

33. User interface examples Direct manipulation Heads up display Transparency Dynamic

34. ObjectiveFrame • 3D beam analysis • Direct manipulation interface • ”Feedback mode” for visualising deflection in real-time. • Visualisation of section forces and deformation

35. Example of use…

36. 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

37. 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.

38. The models

39. The students

40. The results

41. 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

42. More information • ForcePAD and ObjectiveFrame can be found athttp://www.byggmek.lth.se under Resources