ABAQUS FAQ

ABAQUS Availability
ABAQUS Documentation
Parallel Execution with ABAQUS
Resource Requirements for ABAQUS
ABAQUS CAE/Viewer Problems
Additional Information

ABAQUS Availability

The table below summarizes the various versions of ABAQUS on the SC systems.

Default versions are designated with an asterisk (*). Use the 'abaqus' command to invoke the default version.
For hydra, you must load the abaqus module to initialize your environment for ABAQUS.

Please refer to this page for getting started with modules.

Host	Version	Standard/Explicit	CAE	Viewer	Command to Use
hydra	6.6-3	Yes	-	-	abq663
hydra	6.7-2	Yes	-	-	abq672
hydra	6.8-3 (*)	Yes	-	-	abq683
SCLAB PCs	6.6-3	-	Yes	Yes	abq663
SCLAB PCs	6.7-2	-	Yes	Yes	abq672
SCLAB PCs	6.8-3 (*)	-	Yes	Yes	abq683

ABAQUS Documentation

ABAQUS Documentation is available for the following versions:

Parallel Execution with ABAQUS

Parallel execution for ABAQUS Standard and Explicit may be needed for long running analyses. Usage information and caveats for parallel execution can be found in Chapter 11.9 of the ABAQUS Analysis User's Manual.

Resource Requirements for ABAQUS

You should use the abaqus datacheck to get an estimate of the resource needs for your ABAQUS simulation. The resource estimates will look like this:

           M E M O R Y   A N D   D I S K   E S T I M A T E
    SUMMARY FOR CURRENT NODE ORDERING  (STEP 1  TO  STEP 2)

  (NOTE THAT IF NODE ORDERING CHANGES THE SIZE ESTIMATES FOR THE STEPS WILL CHANGE)


   STEP   MAXIMUM DOF     FLOATING PT    MINIMUM MEMORY      MEMORY TO      REQUIRED DISKSPACE
          WAVEFRONT       OPERATIONS       REQUIRED        MINIMIZE I/O
                        PER ITERATION     (MBYTES)           (GBYTES)          (GBYTES)

     1        3930         2.62E+11        346.49               1.37              1.53
     2        3930         2.62E+11        346.49               1.37              1.53
  ----    ---------      ------------    -------------     -------------      -------------
   MAX        3930         2.62E+11        346.49               1.37              1.53

          THE TABLE ABOVE PROVIDES A STEP BY STEP SUMMARY OF SOME BASIC SIZING INFORMATION
          FOR THE PROBLEM. SOME FURTHER DESCRIPTION OF THE PARAMETERS GIVEN FOLLOWS:
  
          (1) MAXIMUM DOF WAVEFRONT - SIZE OF THE BIGGEST FRONT IN THE EQUATION SOLVER.
              PROVIDES A BASIC SIZING OF THE MOST MEMORY INTENSIVE SEGMENT OF SOLVER.
          (2) FLOATING POINT OPERATIONS PER ITERATION - MEASURE OF THE NUMBER OF FLOATING
              POINT OPERATIONS REQUIRED FOR A SINGLE SOLVER PASS. ON A GIVEN PLATFORM
              THE TIME REQUIRED FOR A SOLVER PASS WILL BE ROUGHLY A LINEAR FUNCTION
              OF THIS VALUE.
              NOTE - EXCEPT FOR THE FIRST STEP, THE VALUE IN THIS TABLE DOES NOT INCLUDE
                     ADDITIONAL FLOATING POINT OPERATIONS THAT ARE REQUIRED IN MULTIPLE LOAD
                     CASE STEPS WHEN CONSTRAINTS CHANGE FROM LOAD CASE TO LOAD CASE.  THIS
                     SITUATION CAUSES A REORDERING TO BE PERFORMED, AT WHICH TIME AN UPPER
                     BOUND ON THE NUMBER OF ADDITIONAL FLOATING POINT OPERATIONS WILL BE
                     CALCULATED AND INCLUDED UNDER THE ESTIMATE SUMMARIES FOR THE RELEVANT
                     STEPS (SEE NOTE BELOW ON REORDERING).
          (3) MINIMUM MEMORY REQUIRED - MINIMUM POSSIBLE MEMORY VALUE FOR standard_memory
              THAT ENABLES Abaqus TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM. USE OF MEMORY WILL BE MINIMIZED BY
              WRITING AS MUCH INFORMATION AS POSSIBLE TO DISK WHICH WILL INCREASE I/O TIME.
          (4) MEMORY TO MINIMIZE I/O - VALUE OF standard_memory THAT ALLOWS Abaqus TO KEEP
              ALL SIGNIFICANT SCRATCH FILES IN MEMORY. THIS WILL MINIMIZE I/O TIME FOR THE USER
              WITH ACCESS TO A LARGE AMOUNT OF MEMORY.
          (5) REQUIRED DISKSPACE - AMOUNT OF DISK REQUIRED FOR SCRATCH FILES. THESE WILL BE
              DELETED AT THE END OF THE ANALYSIS.
  
  
           NOTE - WHENEVER POSSIBLE THE USER SHOULD SET standard_memory TO BE LESS THAN THE
          PHYSICAL MEMORY ON THE MACHINE. UNLESS NECESSARY USERS SHOULD NOT MAKE USE
          OF VIRTUAL MEMORY EVEN IN AN ATTEMPT TO KEEP SCRATCH FILES IN MEMORY.
  
           NOTE - IF A REORDERING IS PERFORMED (THIS WILL ONLY GENERALLY BE DONE FOR FINITE-
          SLIDING CONTACT PROBLEMS), THE SIZE ESTIMATES DONE AT THIS TIME WILL NO LONGER 
          BE VALID. THE ESTIMATES WILL BE REDONE IN THE EVENT OF A REORDERING AND A NEW 
          SUMMARY WILL BE PRINTED FOR THE REMAINING STEPS.
  
  
  
           S I Z E   E S T I M A T E S   F O R   C U R R E N T   S T E P
  
          NUMBER OF EQUATIONS                        85902
          MAX DOF WAVEFRONT                          3930
          FLOATING POINT OPS PER SOLVER ITERATION    2.62E+11
          MEMORY USED FOR STEP                     362.09 MBYTES
  
  
           ESTIMATED FILE SIZES
  
           FILE           MWORDS           GBYTES
  
          unit 10          0.136            0.001
          .fct            71.482            0.533
          .uft            71.482            0.533
          .nck             2.273            0.017
          .opr            60.399            0.450
          -------        -------          -------
           TOTAL         205.773            1.533

Using the Memory To Minimize I/O (GBytes) column, you can determine an adequate value (2000 mb in this case) for the standard_memory parameter, which should be defined in a file named abaqus_v6.env (in the same directory as your input files) as shown below:

standard_memory = "2000 mb"

You may also need to increase the pre_memory parameter. For more information about the pre_memory and standard_memory parameters, consult Chapter 3.4, Managing memory and disk resources of the ABAQUS Analysis User's Manual and the ABAQUS man page.

ABAQUS CAE/Viewer Problems

Simulia Inc. does not support ABAQUS CAE when run from one of the SC supercomputers and displayed on another computer. If you are having problems with ABAQUS CAE, please try the following command: '<abaqus> cae -mesa' where <abaqus> is the appropriate ABAQUS as listed in the above table. This may also apply to ABAQUS Viewer.

More Information

More information about using ABAQUS can be found at the abaqus man page (via the man abaqus command). You may need to initialize your environment for ABAQUS to enable access to the man page. The ABAQUS man page on each system includes system specific such as working with the system's compilers and batch system.