The first time you open the OnScale application, you will have the choice between 3 modes to work with the software: Designer, Analyst or Post-Process.
If you have never worked with CAE software, you may not understand fully the difference and which of those modes is the most appropriate for you.
Let’s take a quick look around at those 3 main simulation modes together in video:
Computational Engineering started many years ago on main frames with punch cards… at that time, nothing was graphical and everything was text-based.
As the technology improved, it gained a lot of traction through the advance of evolved 3D graphics and various kinds of visualization techniques.
Many FEA codes out there thus kept a strong code base while getting a lot of new ways to vizualize data and give designers better, faster and easier tools to use.
OnScale is no different from that, it has very strong and robust algorithms of calculation in Fortran and many script-based tools and a graphical interface which makes the generation of FE models for diverse type of applications fast and convenient.
Now let’s talk about the 3 main modes OnScale has:
Creating a simple model with the Designer Mode
The Designer mode allows any design engineer to quickly build a virtual model using a set of graphical powerful tools
The process is usually straightforward and consists of building the geometry, setting the mesh size, assigning loads and boundary conditions and setting a few parameters such as the time step and the type of result outputs that we want.
Simulation can then be launched on the cloud using as many processors as required to solve it and provide results.
Of course, if you need any help or tutorials, we have quite a bunch of them available:
https://support.onscale.com/hc/en-us/categories/360000582052-Tutorials
Let’s suppose now that you have already mastered Designer Mode and that you need to have access to MORE.
While most CAE software hides scripting in hidden modules, OnScale gives you direct and immediate access to this in the Analyst mode.
Let’s take a look at what you get in there.
The power of scripting in Analyst Mode
Analyst Mode brings the bar of possibilities even higher by allowing you to fiddle directly with the core script of your model.
You need a simple change of a parameter but do not want to go through all the GUI menus?
That's fine, we've got you covered.
While OnScale Designer mode allows parametric studies, the real power of using Analyst Mode comes from the possibility to make EVERYTHING parametric.
Want to change one parameter and sweep through hundreds or design possibilities?
No problem.
Within Analyst Mode, you have the full creative freedom to setup your model the way you want.
The script syntax is easy to understand. Check the sample script below which is used to tell the solver that you want to calculate the acoustic pressure. It’s very easy to understand what it does:
calc
pres acoustic /* Calculate acoustic pressure
end
We have also got you covered with a library full of example models that you can freely dig into… and which are fully documented too!
https://support.onscale.com/hc/en-us/categories/360000582072-Advanced-Examples
Ok, now that you got your magnificent results, what do you do with them?
That’s where the 3rd mode of OnScale comes into play: The Post-Process Mode.
Viewing results graphically in the Post-Process Mode
Every good FEA engineer knows that a simulation is only worth something if the results you get from it are actually good and accurate.
That’s why you need a way to check those results in depth… to know the value of each node, plot the graphs you really need to see and visualize instantaneously where the problem lies.
Post-Process mode does exactly that!
You can, for example, visualize results like a time history of acoustic pressure, or full model color displays of wave velocity or displacements.
You can view these results in different windows (called ‘viewports’) and use the many tools available to get to the core of your model quickly and easily.
How to use OnScale in the best possible way?
The wonderful thing about OnScale is that it really opens a vista of possibilities that were previously unavailable to many engineers.
Want to quickly set up an acoustic-solid coupled analysis and get results very quickly?
No problem, just use Designer Mode
Want to go deeper and set a fully parametric analysis which will allow you to sweep through hundreds or even thousands of iterations?
Check, import your designer model into Analyst Mode, change a parameter and you have it!
Did I forgot to mention that the post-processing was way faster than many products on the market?
One may think that viewing results should be almost immediate (and it is with OnScale), but sometimes the reality is not exactly matching the speech in other CAE packages… you may have to wait for hours to load results for big models (Yep)
Not with OnScale, now is now. Engineering doesn’t wait.