Transfer results from Abaqus to Matlab

Dear all,

A new submission has been made which aims to provide a link between Abaqus and Matlab. The submission has the form of a new toolbox (a zip file containing Matlab code, Abaqus code, and the relevant applications and examples).

It occurs very often, that researchers have to resort to techniques and/or algorithms that need Abaqus to be linked to Matlab. The first is a commercial finite element software for performing finite element analyses of various types. In some cases, the results of an Abaqus analysis need to be post-processed in some way. The first step to achieve this is to make the various output data easy to manipulate in some way. On the other hand, Matlab programming language is usually used for various tasks, as it is a high level programming language, enabling the user to easily handle the various data involved. Therefore, a link has to be created between Abaqus and Matlab, to easily transfer the results from the former to the latter for further processing.

It is well known that Abaqus can run in two ways: either by opening Abaqus/CAE and sub-mit a job in the Job module, or by opening Abaqus/Command and running the analysis by specifying an input file containing the necessary options for the analysis to be conducted. Apartr from these, there is also the possibility of running an Abaqus analysis within Matlab, without opening Abaqus/CAE or even Abaqus/Command. This is demonstrated in the various verification analyses included within the Abaqus2Matlab package.

Although Abaqus uses user subroutines written in Fortran programming language and Python for various tasks, until today it is not configured to interface with Matlab in some way. Abaqus2Matlab is a Matlab toolbox, which can be used to retrieve results from an Abaqus analysis, with a very small modification of the input file. The modification necessary for Abaqus to produce the results requested can be seen in the manuals of the functions accompanying this toolbox.

Abaqus2Matlab is a program for the extraction of Abaqus analysis results to Matlab. It is written in MATLAB programming language and is available as source code distributed under a BSD-style license (see License.txt inside the package). This toolbox aims to solve the aforementioned issues, and to provide a linking between Abaqus and Matlab, which will enable the two different softwares to cooperate, enabling thus Abaqus users to effectively postprocess Abaqus results.

INSTRUCTIONS FOR USE: After downloading the package, the files have to be extracted. After this, open the file named "Documentation.m" in Matlab and run it (press F5). Then, type "web('Documentation.html')" in the Matlab command window (then enter) to view the documentation of Abaqus2Matlab.

The author of this package is open to any recommendations, observations, bug reports, comments (positive or negative), which will be used as a feedback to improve the toolbox in future versions.

The toolbox is available for download at ResearchGate:https://www.researchgate.net/publication/290440223_Abaqus2Matlab_-_Progr..., and File Exchange of Matlab Central:http://www.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/fileexchange/54919-abaqus2matlab.

Enjoy and rate!