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OpenFOAM (for "Open-source Field Operation And Manipulation") is a C++ toolbox for the development of customized numerical solvers, and pre-/post-processing utilities for the solution of
continuum mechanics Continuum mechanics is a branch of mechanics that deals with the mechanical behavior of materials modeled as a continuous mass rather than as discrete particles. The French mathematician Augustin-Louis Cauchy was the first to formulate such ...
problems, most prominently including
computational fluid dynamics Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is a branch of fluid mechanics that uses numerical analysis and data structures to analyze and solve problems that involve fluid flows. Computers are used to perform the calculations required to simulate t ...
(CFD). The OpenFOAM software is used in research organisations, academic institutes and across many types of industries, for example, automotive,
manufacturing Manufacturing is the creation or production of goods with the help of equipment, labor, machines, tools, and chemical or biological processing or formulation. It is the essence of secondary sector of the economy. The term may refer to a ...
,
process engineering Process engineering is the understanding and application of the fundamental principles and laws of nature that allow humans to transform raw material and energy into products that are useful to society, at an industrial level. By taking advantage ...
and
environmental engineering Environmental engineering is a professional engineering discipline that encompasses broad scientific topics like chemistry, biology, ecology, geology, hydraulics, hydrology, microbiology, and mathematics to create solutions that will protect and ...
. OpenFOAM is
open-source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Ope ...
which is freely available and licensed under the
GNU General Public License The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end user In product development, an end user (sometimes end-user) is a person who ultimately uses or is intended to ulti ...
Version 3, with the following variants: # OpenFOAM, released by OpenCFD Ltd. (with the name trademarked since 2007) first released as open-source in 2004. (Note: since 2012, OpenCFD Ltd is wholly-owned subsidiary of ESI Group) # FOAM-Extend, released by Wikki Ltd. (since 2009) # OpenFOAM, released by OpenFOAM Foundation. (since 2011)


History

The name FOAM has been claimed to appear for the first time as a post-processing tool written by Charlie Hill, in the early 90s in Prof. David Gosman's group in
Imperial College London Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, who developed his vision for a ...
. As a counter argument , it has been claimed that Henry Weller created the FOAM library for field operation and manipulation which interfaced to the GUISE (Graphical User Interface Software Environment) which was created by Charlie Hill for interfacing to AVS. Nevertheless, as a continuum mechanics / computational fluid dynamics tool, the first development of FOAM (which became OpenFOAM later on) was virtually always presumed to be initiated by Henry Weller at the same institute by using the C++ programming language rather than the
de facto ''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with '' de jure'' ("by l ...
standard programming language FORTRAN of the time to develop a powerful and flexible general simulation platform. From this initiation to the founding of a company called Nabla Ltd, (predominantly) Henry Weller and Hrvoje Jasak carried out the basic development of the software for almost a decade. For a few years, FOAM was sold as a commercial code by Nabla Ltd. However, on 10 December 2004, FOAM was released under GPL and was renamed to OpenFOAM. In 2004, Nabla Ltd was folded. Immediately afterwards, Henry Weller, Chris Greenshields and Mattijs Janssens founded OpenCFD Ltd to develop and release OpenFOAM. At the same time, Hrvoje Jasak founded the consulting company Wikki Ltd and maintained a
fork In cutlery or kitchenware, a fork (from la, furca ' pitchfork') is a utensil, now usually made of metal, whose long handle terminates in a head that branches into several narrow and often slightly curved tines with which one can spear foods ...
of OpenFOAM called openfoam-extend, later renamed t
foam-extend
In April 2008, the OpenFOAM development moved to using git for its source code repository. On 5 August 2011, OpenCFD transferred the OpenFOAM software (
source code In computing, source code, or simply code, is any collection of code, with or without comment (computer programming), comments, written using a human-readable programming language, usually as plain text. The source code of a Computer program, p ...
) and documentation from OpenCFD to the newly incorporated OpenFOAM Foundation, registered in Delaware State, USA. On 8 August 2011, OpenCFD was acquired by
Silicon Graphics International Silicon Graphics International Corp. (SGI; formerly Rackable Systems, Inc.) was an American manufacturer of computer hardware and software, including high-performance computing systems, x86-based servers for datacenter deployment, and visual ...
(SGI). On 12 September 2012,
ESI Group ESI Group provides virtual prototyping software that simulates a product's behavior during testing, manufacturing and real-life use. Engineers in a variety of industries use its software to evaluate the performance of proposed designs in the early ...
announced the acquisition of OpenCFD Ltd, becoming a wholly-owned subsidiary of ESI Group, and OpenCFD retaining its ownership of the OpenFOAM trademark. On 25 April 2014, The OpenFOAM Foundation Ltd was incorporated in England, as a
company limited by guarantee In British, Australian, Bermudian, Hong Kong and Irish company law (and previously New Zealand), a company limited by guarantee (CLG) is a type of corporation used primarily (but not exclusively) for non-profit organisations that require legal pe ...
with all assets transferred to the UK and the US entity dissolved, together with changes to the governance of the Foundation. Weller and Greenshields left OpenCFD and formed CFD Direct Ltd in March 2015. The OpenFOAM Foundation Ltd directors are Henry Weller, Chris Greenshields, and Cristel de Rouvray (the CEO of the ESI Group). The following are the three main variants of OpenFOAM: # OpenFOAM, Foundation, developed and maintained primarily by CFD Direct Ltd with a sequence based identifier (e.g. 6.0) (from 2011). # OpenFOAM, OpenCFD, developed and maintained mainly by OpenCFD Ltd. (ESI Group company since 2012) with a date-of-release identifier (e.g. v1606) (from 2016). # The FOAM-Extend Project, mainly maintained by Wikki Ltd. (from 2009).


OpenFOAM Governance

In 2018, OpenCFD Ltd. and some of its industrial, academic, and community partners established an administrative body, i.e. OpenFOAM Governance, to allow the OpenFOAM's user community to decide/contribute the future development and direction of their variant of the software. The structure of OpenFOAM Governance consisted of a ''Steering Committee'' and various ''Technical Committees''. The Steering Committee comprised representatives from the main sponsors of OpenFOAM in industry, academia, release authorities and consultant organisations. The organisation composition of the initial committee involved members from OpenCFD Ltd.,
ESI Group ESI Group provides virtual prototyping software that simulates a product's behavior during testing, manufacturing and real-life use. Engineers in a variety of industries use its software to evaluate the performance of proposed designs in the early ...
,
Volkswagen Volkswagen (),English: , . abbreviated as VW (), is a German motor vehicle manufacturer headquartered in Wolfsburg, Lower Saxony, Germany. Founded in 1937 by the German Labour Front under the Nazi Party and revived into a global brand post ...
, General Motors,
FM Global FM Global is an American mutual insurance company based in Johnston, Rhode Island, United States, with offices worldwide, that specializes in loss prevention services primarily to large corporations throughout the world in the ''Highly Protecte ...
, TotalSim Ltd., TU Darmstadt, and Wikki Ltd. In addition, nine technical committees were established in the following areas: Documentation,
high performance computing High-performance computing (HPC) uses supercomputers and computer clusters to solve advanced computation problems. Overview HPC integrates systems administration (including network and security knowledge) and parallel programming into a multi ...
,
meshing A mesh is a barrier made of connected strands of metal, fiber, or other flexible or ductile materials. A mesh is similar to a web or a net in that it has many attached or woven strands. Types * A plastic mesh may be extruded, oriented, ...
, multiphase, numerics,
optimisation Mathematical optimization (alternatively spelled ''optimisation'') or mathematical programming is the selection of a best element, with regard to some criterion, from some set of available alternatives. It is generally divided into two subfi ...
,
turbulence In fluid dynamics, turbulence or turbulent flow is fluid motion characterized by chaotic changes in pressure and flow velocity. It is in contrast to a laminar flow, which occurs when a fluid flows in parallel layers, with no disruption between ...
, marine applications, and
nuclear Nuclear may refer to: Physics Relating to the nucleus of the atom: *Nuclear engineering *Nuclear physics *Nuclear power *Nuclear reactor *Nuclear weapon *Nuclear medicine *Radiation therapy *Nuclear warfare Mathematics *Nuclear space * Nuclear ...
applications with the members from the organisations of OpenCFD Ltd., CINECA,
University of Zagreb The University of Zagreb ( hr, Sveučilište u Zagrebu, ; la, Universitas Studiorum Zagrabiensis) is the largest Croatian university and the oldest continuously operating university in the area covering Central Europe south of Vienna and all of ...
, TU Darmstadt,
National Technical University of Athens The National (Metsovian) Technical University of Athens (NTUA; el, Εθνικό Μετσόβιο Πολυτεχνείο, ''National Metsovian Polytechnic''), sometimes known as Athens Polytechnic, is among the oldest higher education institution ...
, Upstream CFD GmbH,
University of Michigan , mottoeng = "Arts, Knowledge, Truth" , former_names = Catholepistemiad, or University of Michigania (1817–1821) , budget = $10.3 billion (2021) , endowment = $17 billion (2021)As o ...
, and EPFL.


Structure


Software structure

The OpenFOAM layout consists of two main directories: * OpenFOAM-: OpenFOAM libraries whose directory layout is shown in the side-figure * ThirdParty: A set of third-party libraries


Simulation structure

OpenFOAM
simulation A simulation is the imitation of the operation of a real-world process or system over time. Simulations require the use of models; the model represents the key characteristics or behaviors of the selected system or process, whereas the ...
s are configured by several plain text input files located across the following three directories: * system/: ** controlDict ** fvSchemes ** fvSolution ** fvOptions (optional) ** (other ''dictionaries'' (configuration files in OpenFOAM)) * constant ** polyMesh/ ** (other dictionaries) * 0/ (or another initial time directory) ** (field files) Additional directories can be generated, depending on user selections. These may include: * (result time directories): field predictions as a function of iteration count or time * postProcessing/: data typically generated by function objects data conversion, e.g. VTK


See also

* ParaView an open-source multiple-platform application for interactive scientific visualization *
Computational fluid dynamics Computational fluid dynamics (CFD) is a branch of fluid mechanics that uses numerical analysis and data structures to analyze and solve problems that involve fluid flows. Computers are used to perform the calculations required to simulate t ...
*
Finite volume method The finite volume method (FVM) is a method for representing and evaluating partial differential equations in the form of algebraic equations. In the finite volume method, volume integrals in a partial differential equation that contain a divergenc ...
*
Computer simulation Computer simulation is the process of mathematical modelling, performed on a computer, which is designed to predict the behaviour of, or the outcome of, a real-world or physical system. The reliability of some mathematical models can be dete ...
* Computer-aided design *
Computer-aided engineering Computer-aided engineering (CAE) is the broad usage of computer software to aid in engineering analysis tasks. It includes , , , durability and optimization. It is included with computer-aided design (CAD) and computer-aided manufacturing (CAM) ...


References


External links


OpenFOAM Foundation website

DLR: Future Aircraft Engineering - The Numerical Simulation
{{DEFAULTSORT:Openfoam 2004 software C++ software Computational fluid dynamics Computer-aided engineering software for Linux Continuum mechanics Fluid dynamics Free science software Free software Free software programmed in C++ Open Source computer aided engineering applications Scientific simulation software