Implementing geometries for particle transport problems is one of the major time consuming tasks. The common approach of radiation transport codes is based on Constructive Solid Geometry (CSG) and requires textual input of the boolean geometry tree. This makes the creation of models a tedious and error prone task, which is especially hard to master for novice users.
 
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SimpleGeo is an interactive solid modeler which allows for flexible and easy creation of the models via drag & drop, as well as on-the-fly inspection. In addition it includes new debugging facilities, based on stochastic as well as deterministic methods, in order to validate the created geometry with immediate visual feedback of problematic regions.

 

In more detail....

SimpleGeo allows the user to interactively build geometries using a number of basic primitives that are connected by boolean operations. Simply by adding these objects to a tree with the mouse, the 3D geometry is evaluated and displayed. Consequently the created objects can be inspected immediately for corrections or modifications. The camera-view can easily be rotated, panned and zoomed by the user. In addition the user can select sub-branches of the CSG trees which are highlighted and also the original primitives that make up a sub-branch can be overlayed as wire-frames.

In order to facilitate and enable parametric modeling SimpleGeo has a built in scripting language which can be used for procedural modeling. This language has access to most parts of the modeling kernel and thus, allows the user to implement additional specific functionality himself.

SimpleGeo currently allows for importing and viewing of FLUKA (old & new syntax) & PHITS & MCNP(X) geometries and their export to various free or commercial raytracing packages. In addition new geometries can be created from scratch and exported to FLUKA, using either the old or the new syntax, or PHITS or MCNP and MCNPX.

 

Release 4.3 includes the following major features

Feature Description
>> Geometry creation Interactive point, click, drag & drop creation of the CSG tree
>> Export
  • FLUKA geometry (old & new syntax with names)
  • MCNP, MCNPX geometry (names can be used that are converted automatically)
  • PHITS geometry
>> Interactive camera The geometry can be panned, rotated and zoomed with the mouse. Perspective als well as parallel projections (including rulers) are available.
>> Various display models
  • wire-frame
  • flat shading
  • Gouraud shading
  • contour display
  • anti-aliasing
  • clipping planes
  • X-ray rendering
  • Edge-ray rendering
>> User configurable rendermaterials A set of predefined render materials is available. These can be extended by the user with a material editor with a rendered preview. Transparent materials are supported.
>> Body identification Bodies & regions can be identified with a mouse click or searched via names with optional regular expressions.
>> Selective visibility The visibility of objects can be specified by the user either for the objects themselves or by material groups. Visibility configurations can be saved and loaded any time.
>> Procedural modeling A (Visual-Basic like) scripting language is supplied for parametrized modeling and user-implemented functionality.
>> Import
  • Proprietary format (also for merging existing geometries)
  • FLUKA old syntax
  • FLUKA new syntax (including pre-processor statements)
  • ALIFE - FLUKA inputs
  • PHITS (beta version 1.0 of importer)
  • MCNP(X) (beta version 1.0 of importer)

 
>> 3D - Export
  • Acad DXF
  • Wavefront OBJ
  • POV Ray
  • VRML - web export
  • 3D Studio 3DS
  • Stereolitography STL (ASCII & binary)
  • PBRT
>> Undo & Redo Commands & modifications can be undone and redone, including whole sequences of commands.
>> Debugger Visual debugging of geometries using various newly developed stochastic & deterministic algorithms and visual feedback
>> Volume & surface area calculation Volumes and masses of regions can be calculated with different algorithms. Surface areas of boolean solids can be obtained as well.
>> Measurements of distances Distances in the geometry can be measured in 2D as well as in 3D, even in perspective projection.

 

* Plugin interface for runtime extensions:

A number of plugins are under development which extend the functionality of SimpleGeo beyond solid modeling.
One of these plugins is called DaViz3D which allows for displaying data on top of the geometry as well as
data extraction and export to finite element software COMSOL. Please refer to the manual for more information.


>> Platform Windows XP, Windows Vista, Win 7
 
Linux port is foreseen. Currently it is suggested to run the native Windows implementation using a virtual machine like Virtual Box (open source).

 
>> Hardware >= Pentium 4
  OpenGL accelerated graphics card (recommended)
  >512 MB RAM (1 GB recommended)