User`s guide

MADYMO Coupling Manual Release 7.5
1 General Information
1.1 Introduction
This manual gives an overview of the requirements to perform a simulation with MADY-
MO coupled to another program. Additionally, it explains why MADYMO facilitates a cou-
pling with other software, how the coupling works and what types of coupling are supported.
Hereafter, the coupling to another program is generically termed PARTNER, unless otherwise
specifically indicated. All information in this section applies to all partners unless otherwise
specified.
1.1.1 Why Coupling?
A coupling to another software product provides the opportunity for the user to combine, in
a single simulation, the features from both products. The user may need to combine the two
products because some features may be available in one product and not in the other or the
user may simply rely on one software product for one type of calculation and on the other
product for other types of calculations.
1.1.2 Coupling Type
The coupling between MADYMO and the PARTNER can be done by including MADYMO as
a library in the PARTNER, called direct coupling, and by keeping MADYMO and PARTNER
separated. The latter principal is used in the MPP coupling.
Direct coupling
The coupling between two software products is done through a coupling interface. The in-
formation to be send from one software product to the other is first gathered internally. This
information is then send to the PARTNER through the coupling interface routines. The PART-
NER distributes the data, performs calculations and subsequently gathers data and sends is
back through the interface. This process is illustrated in Fig.
1.1.
MPP coupling
The coupling between two software products is done through the coupling library MADCL.
The information to be send from one software product to the other is not gathered and dis-
tributed but instead all MPP processes on MADYMO side can communicate directly to all
MPP processes on the PARTNER side. The coupling library MADCL takes care of the admin-
istration, i.e. which process can (and should) talk (and listen) to which other process.
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