Distributed visualization of engineering models

Resumen

The growing increase in computational resources for numerical simulation allows researchers and engineers to generate huge amount of data. The understanding of those data through the use of computer graphics techniques is known as Scientific Visualization. Often, it is necessary to have more than one computer/user accessing the same data set, known as Distributed Visualization This work proposes Scientific Visualization of engineering problems through the use of a Distributed Architecture via Internet (using a browser with VRML Plug-in). The simulated data are obtained directly from a data base and the appropriate information is generated to their visualization. Pre-processing data (such as nodes, elements, lines, areas etc) and post-processing data (such as deformation, stress and strain, from a finite element analysis) are generated. A Distributed Architecture is considered which allows the numerical simulation to be done in a main computer (server) and the visualization to take place in another computer (client), by using a simple, but robust, interface, as is a Internet browser, disposing the access from wherever have Internet. Results obtained with the ANSYS software have proven to be satisfactory when compared with the results visualized through the mentioned software. The proposed architecture can be extended to cope with other solid mechanics software.