Caelinux+CalculiX Launcher Under VirtualBox

CalculiX is native linux software. It means that it is writing and testing primarily for linux. Since GCC compiler is cross-platform, CalculiX is ported to Windows, but it is not free from mistakes and problems.
For example CCX (solver) don't pass all verification tests.
CGX (Pre, Post-processor) has many small mistakes (all known builds).
It doesn't matter for small models in 90% of cases, and it is hard to catch and fix them all, because compilers have many small differences.
Also Windows XP, Windows7 and etc, may work differently, even with some new updates. Sometimes it works at Windows7 at home but don't work in other place. It is not so easy to catch all these problems for all windows users in limited time (also, remember that it is free, and  I don't care of all people too much).

It is why CalculiX Launcher for Windows is limited. Also, for same reason, I provide two versions of CGX for Windows:  2.5 and 2.10 (old one is more stable, new one has more functions).

Trying to avoid all these problems and minimize my work, I am suggesting you to use CalculiX under Linux. If you're experienced linux user, you probably have both systems (in dual boot).  Linux can be installed on removable usb drive. Also many people use linux only (engineers with Siemens NX and etc). The other benefit that Salome-Platform is also native linux software, and Salome_MECA (with Code_Aster) don't even have port to Windows.

If you don't know what is linux, you can install it under VirtualBox. In this case you have minimal risk to damage something when installation and finally your linux will be running as regular Windows program.

It is good solution if you have enough memory to run both OS at the same time.
Let's assume that practical minimal portion of RAM, set up for linux in virtualbox,  is about 2.5-3 GB (you also should leave enough amount of RAM for Windows and other windows software). it is not a problem if you have 6-8 GB total amount RAM on your PC.
Disk space should be about 50 GB (to work with comfort, install software, create large models and don't think about free space).
You should setup these limits at the beginning of creation of linux image.

ISO files for linux can be downloaded anywhere. Remember that there is difference between amd64 (x86-64) and i386 (32 bit) architecture. Get right ISO file, that matches your virtualbox setup.
64 bit is recommended for calculation deals because it gives you ability to run large models.

I would recommend you caelinux distribution (64bit) that comes with many engineering programs. Alternative link for ISO files (caelinux2013.zip) is here.
Also you will need to update Salome-MECA to newer version (2015-2016) which is more efficient than 2013 (in caelinux2013 collection).
For 32-bit system you may obtain only Salome-MECA2013 (they stopped providing 32bit for old computers now). 


Please, see the movie , how to do it.

Note: don't update Caelinux to Ubuntu14! It will require some specific work to fix some issues after updates. Linux is not windows, so don't worry for viruses too much.
Just keep your Internet browser and adobe-flash updated (because it is main source of possible threats).


No comments:

Post a Comment