ATTENTION: An important bug is fixed on windows version!!
McCad-Salome: MC geometry conversion tool McCad under Salome platform
McCad is a geometry conversion tool developed at KIT to enable the automatic conversions of CAD models into the Monte Carlo (MC) geometries. This version of McCad is integrated into the open-source Salome platform.
For any questions related to the use of this software/library you may contact Ulrich Fischer([email protected]) or, for technical assistance, contact Lei Lu ([email protected]) and Yuefeng Qiu ([email protected]).Please subscribe our mailing list for receiving latest updates and asking question in our Google group, by send a empty email to [email protected] and reply the comfirmation email.
It is not necessary to compile McCad in order to use it, because we provided also precompiled McCad binaries. You can find them in repository McCad-Salome-Binaries. Compile it only if you cannot find precompiled McCad binaries, or you are going to change the source code. For Using McCad, Please find documents on Github repository McCad-Salome-Docs.
This release is tested under Salome_7.4.0. Using other Salome version is not guarantee to work, and might cause error during this process.
Compilation and installation on Linux system
Installing Salome platform
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Download Salome_7.4.0 platform from http://www.salome-platform.org/downloads/previous-versions/salome-v7.4.0 .
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Under the list "Binaries for officially supported Linux platforms", Choose the version which is closest to your OS.
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You need to register for downloading Salome.
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Extract the zip file into a folder, then go into this folder and run the script "runInstall". A install wizard window will come out.
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Click always "Next", and keep the default value if you don't care.
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If you like, you can change the installation folder;
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It is highly recommended to install all modules except DOCUMENTS, in order to avoid unncessary error.
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There might be warnings on "cppunit" libraries and so on, it won't affect the use of Salome.
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We abbreviate the Salome install folder as $SALOME
Compiling McCad
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Download this package, unzip and rename it as "MCCAD_SRC_0.5.1", place it under $SALOME.
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We need to add MCCAD package into the Salome environment for compiling it. In the following changes, back-up those file before changing them.
- Open $SALOME/build.sh (or
$SALOME/build.sh), find line 32, and add "MCCAD" into the list. At the end it looks like: def_modules="$ {def_modules} RANDOMIZER SIERPINSKY ATOMIC ATOMGEN ATOMSOLV DOCUMENTATION MCCAD" - Add the following environment variables to the end of $SALOME/env_build.sh (if you are using csh, then $SALOME/env_build.csh)
- Open $SALOME/build.sh (or
#------ MCCAD ------
export MCCAD_ROOT_DIR=${INST_ROOT}/MCCAD_0.5.1
if [ -n "${ENV_FOR_LAUNCH}" ] ; then
if [ "${ENV_FOR_LAUNCH}" = "1" ] ; then
exportp PATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/bin/salome
exportp LD_LIBRARY_PATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/lib/salome
exportp PYTHONPATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/bin/salome:${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/lib/python${PYTHON_VERSION}/site-packages/salome
fi
fi
##
#------ MCCAD_src ------
export MCCAD_SRC_DIR=${INST_ROOT}/MCCAD_SRC_0.5.1
- Go to $SALOME, run the following command to compile McCad:
./build.sh MCCAD
- After the compilation, You can find the binaries in $SALOME/INSTALL/MCCAD_0.5.1. Copy this folder "MCCAD_0.5.1" to $SALOME folder.
Installing and running McCad
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Be sure that your $SALOME/MCCAD_0.5.1 folder have following folders:
- bin
- lib
- share
- adm_local
- idl
- include
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Open $SALOME/KERNEL_7.4.0/salome.sh, add the following environment variables into this file.
#------ MCCAD ------
export MCCAD_ROOT_DIR=${INST_ROOT}/MCCAD_0.5.1
if [ -n "${ENV_FOR_LAUNCH}" ] ; then
if [ "${ENV_FOR_LAUNCH}" = "1" ] ; then
exportp PATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/bin/salome
exportp LD_LIBRARY_PATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/lib/salome
exportp PYTHONPATH ${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/bin/salome:${MCCAD_ROOT_DIR}/lib/python${PYTHON_VERSION}/site-packages/salome
fi
fi
##
#------ MCCAD_src ------
export MCCAD_SRC_DIR=${INST_ROOT}/MCCAD_SRC_0.5.1
- In your desktop, create a new file "runSalome.sh" and put following text into this file(replacing $SALOME with actual path!!):
#!/bin/bash
source $SALOME/KERNEL_7.4.0/salome.sh
$SALOME/salome_appli_7.4.0/salome --module=GEOM,SMESH,PARAVIS,MCCAD
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Under Desktop, make this file as executable script using this command:
chmod +x ./runSalome.sh
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You can run McCad-Salome with running this script now.
Compilation and installation on Windows system
ATTENTION: In this following step you need to have Visual Studio 2010. Without it or with other version of Visual Studio will failed in following steps.
Installing Salome platform
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Download Salome_7.4.0 platform from http://www.salome-platform.org/downloads/previous-versions/salome-v7.4.0 .
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The version you need is "SALOME SDK self-extracting archive for 64bits Windows".
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You need to register for downloading Salome.
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Extract the Package into a folder, here brief as $SALOME (be sure to replace it with actual path during installation).
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Open cmd.exe from Windows Start menu, change folder to $SALOME\WORK, and execute "compile.bat". Please take a coffee, because it takes hours. When the compilation finished, Salome platform will be ready.
Compiling McCad
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Download the McCad-Salome package, unzip it.
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In $SALOME\MODULES, Create a folder "MCCAD", put the source code inside, and rename the source code folder as "MCCAD_SRC"
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We need to add McCad into the Salome environment. First make a backup of file $SALOME\WORK\set_env.bat
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in line 55, add "MCCAD" into the "list" (add it anywhere inside the parenthesis, separate with at least one whitespace)
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in line 81, add "GUI GEOM MED SMESH PARAVIS MCCAD" into "env_m_list"(add them inside the parenthesis, separate with at least one whitespace).
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In file $SALOME\WORK\compile.py, add the following line to line 35
all_modules.append('MCCAD')
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Open cmd.exe from Windows Start menu, change folder to $SALOME\WORK, and execute command:
compile.bat MCCAD
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The compilation will finished in a few minutes.
Installing and using McCad
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To run McCad, start cmd.exe in the Windows Start menu, and run the following command:
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$SALOME\WORK\run_salome.bat --module=MCCAD
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If you want to start also geometry, meshing and visualization module, using command: $SALOME\WORK\run_salome.bat --module=GEOM,SMESH,PARAVIS,MCCAD
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One more easy way to run the program is:
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right-click $SALOME\WORK\run_salome.bat and "Send to -> Desktop (short-cut)";
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right-click the short-cut link in the Desktop, choose "properties";
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Behind the value of "Target", add " --module=MCCAD" or "--module=GEOM,SMESH,PARAVIS,MCCAD"(with a whitespace in the front). Click "OK". Next time you can start McCad with this short-cut link.
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Suggestions for further developing McCad If you are going to make further development on this McCad version, here is some general suggestions for you.
- Make the development work on Linux system. Windows VisualStudio is NOT working well with the McCad project due to the complex SALOME environment variable configuration.
- Using QtCreator helps a lot modifying the source code. It provide very similar, or even better IDE environment for further development of McCad.
- Depending on what you are going to modify, you know knowledge of OpenCASCADE to change the McCad Kernel functions; CORBA communication technology, SALOME related programing for the GUI functions; CMAKE for compilation; and for all, C++ skill.
Using QtCreator to develop McCad
After you compiled sucesfully once McCad in Linux, you can use QtCreator to open the CMAKE project of McCad. Before opening QtCreator, you have to register the environment variables of SALOME:
source $SALOME/KERNEL_7.4.0/salome.sh
qtcreator
Open the CmakeLists.txt under "MCCAD_SRC_0.5.1", the McCad project will be loaded automatically. To install the compilation correctly, you should specify the correct path to install the McCad binaries.
- click the QtCreator "Projects" button, in the "CMake arguments" linebox enter "-DCMAKE_INSTALL_PREFIX=$SALOME/MCCAD_0.5.1" (please change $SALOME to the actual folder).
You can now build the project by clicking menu "Build->Build All" or simiply "ctrl + B". However, You will not able to run SALOME from QtCreator, and you have to run SALOME in the way given in the previous section. Also, you will not able to debug the problem, due to the conflict of GDB and python version used by SALOME. The mostly available way is to debug the running process "SALOME_Session_Server" in the system process list (use command "top" to get the pid in order to debug it). If you want to use QtCreator for the debugging, you should do the following steps which is not straight forward:
- open a new terminal, and run QtCreator WITHOUT executing the command "source $SALOME/KERNEL_7.4.0/salome.sh". It is important that QtCreator does not use the python from SALOME installation but use system provided python.
- Open the same McCad project as you open above (do worry about the file synchronization).
- Open menu "Debug"->"Start Debugging"->"Attach to Running Application". In the "Filter" linebox, enter "SALOME_Session_Server" and click the SALOME process you invovke. You are now able to set the break point to debug.
- the SALOME program is frozen because of the debugging, you have to press F5 in the debug QtCreator in order to make further operation.
For more information, you can find in our publications.
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Lei Lu, Yuefeng Qiu, Ulrich Fischer, Improved solid decomposition algorithms for the CAD-to-MC conversion tool McCad, Fusion Engineering and Design, Available online 3 March 2017, ISSN 0920-3796, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.fusengdes.2017.02.040.
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Yuefeng Qiu, Lei Lu, Ulrich Fischer, Integrated approach for fusion multi-physics coupled analyses based on hybrid CAD and mesh geometries, Fusion Engineering and Design, Available online 4 July 2015, ISSN 0920-3796, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fusengdes.2015.06.118.
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L. Lu, U. Fischer, P. Pereslavtsev, Improved algorithms and advanced features of the CAD to MC conversion tool McCad, Fusion Engineering and Design, Volume 89, Issues 9–10, October 2014, Pages 1885-1888, ISSN 0920-3796, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.fusengdes.2014.05.015.
Have fun!