Maplesoft

Maplesoft announced a new release of Maple, the mathematical software that makes it  easy to analyze, explore, visualize, and solve math problems. Maple 2019 includes  improvements to its mathematical engine for both core routines and specialized tools. The release also provides advances to the Maple programming language, more education tools, new visualizations, and other improvements for the mathematicians, educators, students, engineers, and scientists who use it.

Improvements include:

–Hundreds of improvements to core functionality, such as solving equations, integration, factoring, and differential equations
–Increasing the ease in finding symbolic solutions to partial differential equations, including new methods that solve new classes of problems, more flexibility in choosing the methods to try, and improved simplification of the results
–Significant work to strengthen, consolidate, and polish Maple’s support for tensor computations, with support for classical and quantum mechanics, special and general relativity, and standard tensor notation for input and output
–More group theory tools for constructing, computing with, and visualizing more groups, along with significant performance improvements
–More signal processing, including new algorithms, manipulation tools, and visualization techniques
–A comprehensive, easy-to-use environment for the parallel computation of the electronic energies and properties of molecules, available in the new add-on product, the Maple Quantum Chemistry Toolbox from RDMChem

Maple 2019 also includes a variety of improvements in other areas, such as enhancements to the Maple programming language that help customers write more efficient code, a  redesigned start page that makes it even easier for new users to become productive quickly, new visualizations for analyzing data, and additional interactive Math Apps that support teaching and learning key concepts of computer science.

Maplesoft
www.maplesoft.com/products/maple/new_features

 

Bruce Jenkins | Ora Research

Maplesoft announced a new release of MapleMBSE, its software product that enables companies to employ a model-based systems engineering (MBSE) approach to their design projects without requiring every engineer on the project to be an expert in complex MBSE tools.

The new release, MapleMBSE 2019.0, further improves the workflow by making it even easier to create and modify many of the structures used to define and analyze a design. “The usability of MapleMBSE makes productive collaboration on system design projects an achievable goal,” the company said, “and the latest release improves the user experience even further.” For background see our MapleMBSE from Maplesoft radically expands accessibility of model-based systems engineering, published in this blog last July.

Excel-based user interface “provides streamlined interface for each task in an MBSE project”

Using an Excel-based user interface, MapleMBSE provides a streamlined interface for each task in an MBSE project, such as defining requirements, impact analysis, tradeoff studies and failure mode effects analysis. These streamlined interfaces make these tasks significantly easier to perform, the company says, and reduce the time and errors that typically come with using a standard MBSE tool. The new release also includes enhanced support for Systems Modeling Language (SysML), the industry-standard systems architecture modeling language used for requirements capture and management by many MBSE tools, including MapleMBSE.

Increased support is available for a variety of constructs that are used to define requirements, architecture, behavior and relationships, including activity diagrams, state machines and parametric diagrams. By making it easier to create and modify these underlying SysML constructs, the company says the new release further reduces the time and effort required to define requirements and the relationships between them, analyze the impact of changes, and improve the design.

MBSE “lets organizations define, maintain and communicate their project goals throughout every stage of their project”

“Model-based systems engineering lets organizations define, maintain and communicate their project goals throughout every stage of their project, and MapleMBSE makes it significantly easier to involve all the stakeholders in this process,” says Paul Goossens, vice president of engineering solutions at Maplesoft. “The usability of MapleMBSE makes productive collaboration on system design projects an achievable goal, and the latest release improves the user experience even further.”

Other improvements in this release enhance the integration of MapleMBSE with model management systems, including faster model access through Teamwork Cloud. By connecting MapleMBSE to Teamwork Cloud, customers can seamlessly access models created in a number of different tools including MagicDraw and Cameo Systems Modeler. MapleMBSE can also be integrated directly with other SysML-based tools such as IBM Rational Rhapsody.

About Maplesoft

Maplesoft is a leading provider of high-performance software tools for engineering, science and mathematics. Maplesoft Engineering Solutions provide advanced tools and services for system simulation, calculation management and systems engineering, helping organizations maximize the power of their engineering knowledge so they can complete their projects quickly and successfully. The Maplesoft product suite includes Maple for technical computing and calculation management; MapleSim, an advanced system-level modeling and simulation tool; and MapleMBSE, which supports a model-based systems engineering approach to requirements management.

Maplesoft products and services are used in machine design, robotics, aerospace, automotive, industrial automation and many other fields where engineers face complex challenges. Key applications include the creation of digital twins, dynamic analysis of mechanisms, battery systems modeling, heat transfer modeling and bus fleet electrification. Customers include Boeing, FLSmidth, Ford, Google, Intel, NASA, Samsung and others.

MapleMBSE

MapleSim

Maple

Maplesoft

SysML

The demand for innovation is universal across industries, as new products are required to meet higher performance standards without slowing the overall time to market. This reality is perhaps most apparent in the automotive industry, where a wide range of technologies must come together seamlessly if a new product is to be successful. At China Euro Vehicle Technology (CEVT), new development techniques are being created to bring new technologies into passenger vehicles, and ensure successful integration of the many systems present in modern designs.

One of the more advanced technologies available for modern automotive design is system-level modeling, which uses specialized software to model the interactions across an entire system. By taking a system-level modeling approach, CEVT engineer Michael Palander is creating a powerful testing and simulation platform that can be used to verify the functionality of their new automotive technologies at earlier stages in the design process. With its Modelica standard for system-modeling components, the team decided to evaluate MapleSim as the modeling and simulation tool for their larger simulation platform.

The team at CEVT is aiming to create a powerful simulation platform that can validate a wide range of design components, from software controllers to individual hardware subsystems, in what is known as “in-the-loop” simulations. For these kinds of simulations, the system-level models are created not only to be highly accurate, but they must be capable of very efficient computation for real-time usage on test platforms. They chose MapleSim for its ability to create efficient royalty-free code that can run in real-time.

In order to avoid the slowdowns typically involved with taking on a new modeling tool, the Chalmers research team opted for customized training services provided by Maplesoft Engineering Solutions. During a three-day training program, modeling experts from Maplesoft worked directly with the research team, helping them become proficient with MapleSim. The team quickly worked through the basics of model creation, before moving on to training related to their specific project needs, including code generation, exporting models to the Functional Mock-up Interface (FMI) standard, and creating custom components to account for their specific designs. “It’s very easy to get started with MapleSim,” noted Mr. Palander, as he observed his team moving quickly through their design-specific modeling needs.

By working with Maplesoft’s modeling experts, the teams at Chalmers and CEVT were able to easily and efficiently develop workable processes for integrating MapleSim with their own tools, such as their simulation platform, CarMaker. They now use MapleSim to create vehicle models and export them into Functional Mock-up Units (FMUs), which then connect into the rest of their toolchain. The training also provided the engineers and researchers with MapleSim model optimization techniques so they could make quick iterations on design concepts before moving their testing to their in-the-loop simulation platforms.

The approach taken by CEVT in evaluating MapleSim and training as a team in system-level modeling is a sign of their larger commitment to new, innovative approaches in vehicle design. By looking to integrate powerful system-level modeling tools like MapleSim, CEVT is maintaining its position as a leader in virtual engineering techniques. CEVT also ensured they stayed competitive by using Maplesoft’s Engineering Solutions to evaluate their new software as quick as possible. With help from MapleSim, Mr. Palander is confident that CEVT’s system-level modeling project is proceeding in the right direction: “We will succeed in this, I am absolutely sure.”

Maplesoft
www.maplesoft.co

Maplesoft announced a major new release of its flagship product, Maple, the mathematical software that makes it easy to analyze, explore, visualize, and solve math problems. Maple 2018 includes substantial improvements to how customers interact with it. The release includes an extensive collection of improvements in advanced mathematics, visualization, specialized application areas, and more, which will be useful to the mathematicians, educators, engineers, and scientists who rely on these particular features.

People use Maple to do many different things, so the value of the improvements in any new release varies for each user. The improvements to Maple 2018 include:
–An intelligent Context Panel, which brings together and enhances some of Maple’s Clickable Math tools, providing point-and-click access to a variety of mathematical operations.
–Significant enhancements to Maple’s code editor, which makes writing, debugging, and maintaining Maple code and Maple-based applications easy and fast.
–Deeper integration of units into the mathematics engine that simplifies units-based calculations.
–New options for protecting work from modification or viewing, so customers can share their work while remaining in control of their content.

Maple 2018 also includes improvements that deepen its capabilities, as well as features that broaden its applicability. Core mathematical enhancements were made in integration, ordinary and partial differential equations, simplification, graph theory, and more. New abilities include computational geometry, support for performing computations involving thermochemical properties of chemical species, generating practice sheets for students that are graded by Maple automatically, and interpolating unstructured data.

Maplesoft
www.maplesoft.com

Maplesoft announced a major new release of its flagship product, Maple, the mathematical software that makes it extremely easy to analyze, explore, visualize, and solve math problems. Maple 2018 includes substantial improvements to how customers interact with Maple, providing significant benefits to all users no matter what they use Maple for. The release also includes an extensive collection of improvements in advanced mathematics, visualization, specialized application areas, and more, which will be extremely useful to the mathematicians, educators, engineers, and scientists who rely on these particular features.

People use Maple to do many different things, so naturally the value of the improvements in any new release varies for each user. However, Maple 2018 is not a release to skip over, for any customer. Maple 2018 contains a large number of substantial enhancements to how users interact with Maple, which means all customers will see immediate benefits from this release. These improvements include:

An intelligent Context Panel, which brings together and enhances some of Maple’s most powerful Clickable Math tools, providing point-and-click access to a wide variety of mathematical operations and other Maple tools.

Significant enhancements to Maple’s code editor, which makes writing, debugging, and maintaining Maple code and Maple-based applications easier and faster than before.

Deeper integration of units into the mathematics engine that significantly simplifies units-based calculations.

New options for protecting work from modification or viewing, so customers can share their work while remaining in control of their content.

Maple 2018 also includes a wide variety of improvements that deepen its capabilities, as well as new features that broaden its applicability. Core mathematical enhancements were made in integration, ordinary and partial differential equations, simplification, graph theory, and more. New abilities include computational geometry, support for performing computations involving thermochemical properties of chemical species, generating practice sheets for students that are graded by Maple automatically, and interpolating unstructured data.

“While every release of Maple includes a host of improvements across many different areas of the product, people use Maple for very different tasks, and not every change will be equally important to every user. But Maple 2018 is not a release to skip over,” says Dr. Laurent Bernardin, Chief Operating Officer and Chief Scientist at Maplesoft. “With improvements to so many of the ways our users interact with Maple, no matter what they use Maple for, our customers will find that Maple 2018 makes the work they are doing in Maple much easier.”

Maplesoft
www.maplesoft.com

 

Many innovative ideas and technological advances are born from passion, and the motorcycle racing simulator developed by Frédéric Nicolo is no exception. A numerical and scientific calculation engineer in France, Mr. Nicolo’s love for motorcycles inspired him to start his own venture after realizing there were no motorbike simulators that performed at the same level as existing driving simulators for cars. Using MapleSim, the modeling and simulation tool from Maplesoft, he was able to successfully develop his simulator, designed to accommodate the unique characteristics of motorbikes. “The motorbike world addresses a limited audience; motorcycle manufacturers are few and investment in research and development is low compared to the automotive sector,” he said. “Physical phenomena relating to motorbike racing are harder to replicate in a simulator. These encompass a broader spectrum than with cars – such as pitch and roll – and very few of these factors can be disregarded or approximated.”

When operating a motorcycle, the rider needs a lot of relevant information to help him ride his bike in favorable conditions; the right balance between the rider, the motorbike, and the environment is difficult to simulate. Mr. Nicolo set out to design and develop a motorcycle racing simulator to better simulate the physical phenomena surrounding motorbike racing and to translate them into the simulator in the most appropriate way possible for the rider.

In order to simulate the many physical phenomena for this project, it was essential for Mr. Nicolo to find a suitable tool to accurately model them. The various domains involved in the development of a racing simulator make it necessary to have an effective tool that allows for a rapid, highly scalable, multi-domain design model. Previously, Mr. Nicolo used a hand-coded digital model in C++ for motorbike simulations. Coding a motorcycle dynamics model from scratch was a very rewarding experience for him, but it had its limitations, particularly on the level of accuracy and the scalability of the model. “I was then introduced to MapleSim which, I discovered, provides a great amount of sophistication in physical modeling required for these experiments,” Mr. Nicolo explained. “I received access to an evaluation copy of MapleSim and this trial period made me feel confident that the MapleSim solution would meet my numerous requirements, from the perspective of physical modeling, performance and interoperability of the computed generated code. The code generated from a MapleSim model is free of all licensing and proprietary libraries, allowing the user to design digital models that can be adapted seamlessly into many real-time environments.”

Much of his work on the simulator focuses on the calculation of motorcycle dynamics in order to have a solid and realistic simulation basis for the behavior of a motorcycle. The project encompasses the following elements:

–Acquisition of rider/motorbike interactions
–Physical modeling and simulation of the rider, the motorbike and its environment
–Using modeling results to create a realistic experience for the simulator rider
–Description and 3D visualization of the virtual world where the rider and his machine operate
–Inclusion of a sound system in the virtual world

Mr. Nicolo had previous experience using the Modelica modeling language and MapleSim’s use of Modelica helped facilitate the development of a motorcycle dynamics model that incorporates these elements. His models were comprised of elements developed using MapleSim Multibody and 1-D Mechanical Libraries, elements developed in C++ and interfaced in MapleSim, and a servomotor controller developed in MapleSim. He tested the integration of a number of modules previously developed in C++ and, with some adaptation, optimized the generated code, allowing him to build efficient and scalable executables. “I was able to successfully test the real-time run of the motorcycle dynamics model in fixed step at 200µs on a current medium-range machine configuration,” he added.

The models also span multiple domains with inclusion of communication elements such as Ethernet modules, and components, including a driver card needed for the code to work on the motorbike simulation platform, Mr. Nicolo explained. “The goal was to develop a MapleSim model which, once compiled as executable, can be used directly on the simulator,” he said. “MapleSim offers a real advantage as a model-integration platform – combining models from a variety of engineering domains and techniques – because of MapleSim’s Modelica capabilities and the ability to use external C code on MapleSim models.”

Using the MapleSim code generation application was an important step for Mr. Nicolo because it allowed him to generate executable code for reconfiguring the whole motorbike without having to regenerate the model from within MapleSim. The analysis window integrated with MapleSim combines two complementary approaches when processing simulated data, offering an initial qualitative approach that can be executed rapidly by visualizing the results as a 3D video. “With this feature, you can process the information quickly and decide to review your test scenario and modeling, or move toward a more detailed approach with analysis of the simulation results,” Mr. Nicolo said. “There again, the quantitative approach is made easier with the available tools in MapleSim. Comparing the results of several simulations is also a very interesting feature. The post-processing of calculated data and the development of models are greatly simplified by these tools.”

Mr. Nicolo emphasized that his project can continue to benefit from MapleSim as the motorbike simulator becomes more complex and incorporates more accurate models. Moving forward, he plans to utilize MapleSim for even more functions in his simulator project, including data acquisition processing, sizing of mechanical parts and actuators on the simulation platform, and design and development of the control loops of the simulator actuators.

“As the simulator continues to evolve, it will be able to perform even more functions with greater accuracy. The MapleSim solution provides the motorcycle simulator with effective tools to further develop system performance,” Mr. Nicolo said. “MapleSim’s numerous tools and capabilities are driving the success of this project.”

MapleSoft
www.maplesoft.com