Lecture 1

Scripting Basics in Mechanical

14. 5 Release

1 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

2012
 Contents

• Introduction
• Mechanical Application Architecture
• Design Simulation Object (DS)
• Finding Functions in Mechanical Application
• Summary

2 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Introduction
• Scripting language used – Jscript
• Mechanical Application is build on the Workbench-1 (WB1) architecture, same as
Design Modeler
• It’s relatively simpler (compared to DM) to trace the underlying APIs for the various
tasks
• Almost all manual processes can be scripted
– Access geometry entities (bodies, faces, etc.)
– Access existing or create new mesh settings, Named selections, etc.
– Generate mesh, etc.

3 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Execution of J-Scripts

Tools → Run Macro …

4 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Meshing Application Architecture
Workbench Design Modeler and Mechanical application share same architecture

Application
GUI
Note:
HTML XML Meshing and
Mechanical
JavaScript applications shares the
same XML and JScript
Core C++ Application Logic code

Path for accessing JScript and XML files:

C:\Program Files\ANSYS Inc\v145\aisol\DesignSpace\DSPages\Language\en-us\xml
C:\Program Files\ANSYS Inc\v145\aisol\DesignSpace\DSPages\xml

C:\Program Files\ANSYS Inc\v145\aisol\DesignSpace\DSPages\scripts

5 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,
2012
 Design Simulation Object (DS)

DS
• This is the entry point for macro execution into the
Mechanical session
• This is : wb.AppletList.Applet("DSApplet").App
– wb is the Workbench (WB1) master object
• Design Modeler, Mechanical etc. applications are applets
built on this object

6 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Finding Functions

Generic Procedure:
• Locate functionality in GUI
• Search the dsstringtable.xml files for menu string
• Note the corresponding ID of the string
– ID is like: ID_***
• Search for the string id ID_*** in DSPages/xml folder
• Note the methodName under actionCallback
– Command is like: do***
• Search for the command do*** in DSPages/scripts
• Attach a debugger to Mechanical process to see the script in action

7 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Finding The Desired Function
Objective:
• Understand how a pressure load is inserted
Approach:
• Locate functionality in GUI

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 Finding The Desired Function (2)
• Go to ~DSPages\Language\en-us\xml
• Find the ID_** for Menu string “Pressure” from the dsstringtable.xml
You will get the string “Pressure” at multiple
locations. Select the one that is most reasonable
In this case it is:
ID_EnvironmentInsertStructuralLoadPressure

• Search the ID_*** to find the methodName in ~DSPages\xml folder

– Search returns two files
– dscontextmenu.xml
– dstoolbar.xml

9 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Finding The Desired Function (3)
• Open the dscontextmenu.xml file and look for the same string
• The methodName under actionCallback for this string is doInsertEnvironmentPressure
(Searching through “dstoolbar.xml” will also give same methodName)

• Search on the string do*** in ~DSPages/scripts

– Search returns one file DSMenuWrap.js
• Open this file and look for function doInsertEnvironmentPressure

• It has no arguments and it can be called by the following code:

• DS.Script.doInsertEnvironmentPressure();
10 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,
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 Using the Function
Create a JS macro file (e.g. testPressureLoad.js)
• Add a line:
– DS.Script.doInsertEnvironmentPressure();
• Save the file

Run the JS macro file

• Tools  Run Macro...

Did it work?
• No
• Yes  if you have selected the “Environment” node in the tree before calling the macro

11 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Analyzing the Outcome

Lets look into the doInsertEnvironmentPressure function again

• This function is calling another function
– doEnvironmentInsertLoad with an argument 8130

• Search doEnvironmentInsertLoad string in DSPages/scripts

– Search returns two files
– DSMenuWrap.js  Already we have looked into this!
– DSMenuScript.js  Lets look into this now

12 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

2012
 Analyzing the Outcome (2)

There is a check inside

the function
• It works only when the
active object in “Tree”
is Environment object
• Otherwise, it doesn’t
do anything!

13 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

2012
 Attach Debugger to Mechanical session
• To see the script in action, attach
debugger to the Mechanical Process
– Using Visual Studio Professional
• Approach:
– Open Mechanical session
– Start Visual Studio (VS)
– Go to Tools  Attach to Process...
– Select the suitable
"AnsysWBU.exe”
• Note that the "Script" option under
"Type" (column 4 in the window) is
available
• If it is not picked up by default, try
to use the "Select" option (button
on the right of "Attach to" in the
window)
Note: If Design Modeler is also open,
! there may be multiple AnsysWBU.exe
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 Attach Debugger to Mechanical session (2)
• Press the "Attach" button
• In the VS window, select Debug  Break All
• Go back to Mechanical application window and click at any location
– This will pop up the VS window with the JScript in it

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 Attach Debugger to Mechanical (3)

• Search for doInsertEnvironmentPressure and attach a “Break Point”

• Press “Continue (F5) ”

– This will not do anything (for now)
• In Mechanical window, insert a pressure load (as usual)
• This takes the control back to VS, where you have attached the break point

16 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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 Attach Debugger to Mechanical (4)
• “Step Into (F11)” the function
– This will take to the function:
doEnvironmentInsertLoad
• Go line by line “Step Over (F10)”

• Add variables to the Watch window

to check different objects
– Specifically watch
• “ds” and
• “wb”

• When done, you can use “Continue

(F5)”
• And detach the debugger
– Debug  Detach All
17 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,
2012
 Summary
This presentation highlighted following points:
• Mechanical application architecture
• How to find functions to be used in automation scripts

18 © 2011 ANSYS, Inc. November 29,

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