Arranging and renaming your ABAQUS plugins without editing the code. Accessing your plugins collection is made easy using the plugins menu. When you have lots of plugins then it becomes a chore to arrange your menus to suit yourself so that they appear in a logical way that makes them easy to find, with a clear name indicating what they do and when to use them. I have found the following tips have made my user experience more efficient. Limit Visibility When you write your pl

This third article on the mini-project I set myself, to build a version of TETRIS in ABAQUS, focuses on creating the game elements and manipulating the user’s view. The original game was completely 2D, this version appears to be 2D, but it is actually 3D, with the view controlled so that there is no perspective. The visual elements of the game are divided between creating the objects that represent the playing pieces and the playing surface, and control of the view, screen se

Another brief blog post this week as I have been busy on both a coding course and a programming exercise, which, when I get it working, I shall share. Going back to my roots with a simple fluid dynamics code. So for this week I shall simply share the templates that I have made and use, with reminders in place, for making different kinds of ABAQUS scripts. Templates are great. They save you time hammering out the boilerplate and forgetting that basic detail that you are so use

Creativity is corporate survival. Involving, and recognising, people at all levels of the business in problem solving activities is key to motivating new thinking and maximising the chances of getting a great solution. Introduction I believe that achieving a creative, high-visibility environment leads to better ideas, improved staff engagement and retention rates, greater performance, and a stronger, more profitable, company. Building such a space is a challenge and becomes m

A method for running a series of jobs that leaves the user interface free for other activities. Unlike the command line batch script though it leaves the CAE license with the current user. Two essential modern truths: Machines are cheap, good people are expensive. Time is money. Maximise your people’s time and save money by sweating the machines, they will not complain. A lot of FEA models take a while to run. If you set a job to run at 5pm and go home and it finishes at 11pm

Thoughts prompted in part by Dan Davis' book - image book/AI via Krita Maximising the utilisation of your human capital is a terrible...

Dynamic generation of a 3D block in ABAQUS via an interactive dialog box Question: Does AI bring productivity benefits when creating...

Short post pointing out that a lot of uses for AI are ephemeral but still greatly aid productivity.

Article about a script demonstrating the efficiency gains that can be achieved by fluency in scripting and automation for ABAQUS.