When performing the evaluation of engineering structures, today’s designers fully depend on software tools available to their employer. The choice of a software program for design calculations and evaluation of structural elements is typically dictated by its price. Where the demand for engineering design services involves simple structures, the designers turn to single-purpose programs based on engineering tables or databases, particularly in small companies. Finite element method (FEM)-based tools for structural analysis are much less affordable. Also, the time required for FEM analysis is considerably longer than with other methods. As the available design completion times tend to be short, designers typically have to rely on specialized programs (MITCalc, KISSsoft, Autodesk Inventor or PREV). Consequently, they have no other choice but to accept the information and values obtained from these calculation programs, even without understanding their principles.
Science Journal 