ANSYS Command File Programming Features

The following ANSYS command listing, shows some of the commonly used programming features in the ANSYS command file language known as ADPL (ANSYS Parametric Design Language). It illustrates:

entering parameters (variables)
prompting the user for parameters
performing calculations with paramaters; note that the syntax and functions are similar to FORTRAN
control structures
- if - then - else - endif
- looping

This example file does not do anything really useful in itself besides generate keypoints along a line, but it does illustrate some of the "programming features" of the ANSYS command language.

!
/PREP7                  ! preprocessor phase
!
x1 = 5                  ! define some parameters
x2 = 10
*ask,ndivs,Enter number of divisions (default 5),5       
!
! the above command prompts the user for input to be entered into the 
! variable "ndivs"; if only  is entered, a default of "5" is used
!
*IF,ndivs,GT,1,THEN     ! if "ndivs" is greater than "1"
  dx = (x2-x1)/ndivs
  *DO,i,1,ndivs+1,1     ! do i = 1, ndivs + 1 (in steps of one)
    x = x1 + dx*(i-1)
    k,i,x,0,0
  *ENDDO
*ELSE
  k,1,x1,0,0
  k,2,x2,0,0
*ENDIF
!
/pnum,kp,1              ! turn keypoint numbering on
kplot                   ! plot keypoints
klist,all,,,coord       ! list all keypoints with coordinates