About FTool

The Ftool (Two-dimensional Frame Analysis Tool) program was initially developed by an integrated research project coordinated by Professor Marcelo Gattass of the Department of Informatics of PUC-Rio and director of PUC-Rio’s Tecgraf Institute (Technical-Scientific Software Development Institute), with funds received from CNPq (National Council of Technological and Scientific Development). The responsibility for the Ftool is now in the hands of its author Professor Luiz Fernando Martha of the Department of Civil Engineering of PUC-Rio. Former undergraduate students Eduardo Thadeu Leite Corseuil, Vinícius Samu de Figueiredo and Adriane Cavalieri Barbosa, from PUC-Rio’s Civil Engineering Department, contributed to the development of the program as research assistants from March 1991 to December 1992. The program was developed originally on a DOS platform and went through some initial improvements until April 1995.

Waldemar Celes Filho, Professor in the Department od Informatics of PUC-Rio, developed the HED (Half-Edge Data structure) function library for the internal data structure. The program’s numeric analysis module received a contribution from the former PhD student of PUC-Rio, Ivan Fábio Menezes, who is currently Professor in the Department of Mechanical Engineering of PUC-Rio.

From 1997 to 1998, the Ftool was revised by Professor Martha, who used the IUP user-interface system and the CD graphics system, both developed by Tecgraf/PUC-Rio. This graphics interface allows the program to be executed on both Windows and Unix. In February 1998, the version 2.00 was launched. Successive versions of Ftool were then introduced, each one with some improvements.

In August 2000, version 2.08 was also launched for the Linux platform. In version 2.09 (January 2001), specific procedures to aid the educational use of Ftool for structural analysis were incorporated: inextensible and infinitely rigid members and member-end moments. In version 2.10 (November 2001), influence lines were added. In version 2.11 (August 2002), the definition of member cross-sections was improved. Other improvements included property attributes, the ability to import model attributes from other files, an option to define the member side (tension or compression) to draw bending moment diagrams, and an option to draw result values transversal to the members.

In version 2.12 (February 2008) a load train menu with options was added to create and manipulate generic load-trains, with variable numbers of concentrated and distributed loads (full and empty cars), and external and internal live loads. In that version, the critical positions of load-trains were displayed along with influence lines, as well as an option to display internal force envelopes due to load-trains. In version 3.00 (August 2012), the IUP graphics interface was updated to reflect recent evolutions in native interfaces of Windows and Linux. The graphics interface of the Linux version had a considerable improvement because it adopted the GTK package. Among other improvements, one important implementation was the consideration of shear deformations in members (Timoshenko beams). Another important improvement was the elimination of the auxiliary file (extension ".pos") used to link the program with its analysis module (solver). This file may still be saved, but the user must explicitly demand it. In version 3.01, the user interface for object transformations was modified so the user could choose to perform transformations that maintained the topology of the structure while displaying static results and influence lines, which are dynamically updated. Cross-section shape tables from Vallourec and Mills were also added.

Ftool went through a profound transformation in version 4.00. Its development was transferred to ALIS Engineering and Systems Solutions and an advanced edition for professional use, with a commercial license, was developed. The objective of the advanced edition is to supply the needs of structural designers. The current advanced edition is the first of many editions that will come in the following years, resulting from the demands of several users from Brazil and other countries. Commercialization of the advanced edition is exclusively oriented towards the development of new functionalities, which before was not possible solely by the individual work of the program’s author. It should be noted that free distribution of Ftool's basic edition will continue.

In version 4.00, the deformed configuration of the structure can now be displayed with or without values, in the global (vertical and horizontal) or local (transversal and axial) coordinate systems. Multiple keyboard shortcuts have been added to control the program, allowing for a more efficient manipulation of the model by more advanced users. The advanced edition allows the creation of multiple load cases, as well as weighted load case combinations and the visualization of result envelopes for load cases and combinations. This edition also includes generic prismatic cross-sections created by the composition of trapezoids, facilitating the use of the program with cross-section shapes, unlike those already supplied by the program. Finally, this edition allows the customization of the program's initialization, in which the user can define the units and number formats to be used and multiple visualization parameters, among other options.

Professor Luiz Fernando Martha of PUC-Rio’s Department of Civil Engineering is Ftool’s (Two-dimensional Frame Analysis Tool) idealizer and the one responsible for the program.
The program was initially developed through an integrated research project coordinated by Professor Marcelo Gattass from PUC-Rio’s Computer Science Department and leader of PUC-Rio’s Tecgraf Institute (Technical-Scientific Software Development Institute) with support from CNPq (National Council of Technological and Scientific Development).
Former PUC-Rio Civil Engineering undergraduate students Eduardo Thadeu Leite Corseuil, Vinícius Samu de Figueiredo and Adriane Cavalieri Barbosa contributed to the development of the DOS version of the program as research assistants from March of 1991 until December of 1992.
Waldemar Celes Filho, professor of PUC-Rio’s Computer Science Department, worked on development of the HED (Half-Edge Data structure) function library for the internal data structure.
Former PUC-Rio PhD student Ivan Fábio Menezes (currently professor at PUC-Rio’s Mechanical Engineering Department) contributed to the program’s numeric analysis module.
The first version of the program’s manual (for version 2.07) was created by Luís Fernando Kaefer, a former Master’s and Doctorate student at the Structural and Foundation Engineering Department (PEF) and Computational Mechanics Laboratory (LMC) of the Polytechnic School of the University of São Paulo (EPUSP).
Christiana Niskier, former PUC-Rio Civil Engineering bachelor and master’s student, collaborated in the implementation of multiple cross-section types.
Pedro Cordeiro Marques, former PUC-Rio Civil Engineering bachelor student, collaborated with the manual’s update for version 2.11.
The manual's first English translation for version 2.11 was written by Professor Robert H. Dodds, Jr. and Mr. Adam Carlyle from the Department of Civil & Environmental Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. November 2003
The development of internal force envelopes due to load-trains was done by Gisele Cristina da Cunha Holtz, a Tecgraf Institute/PUC-Rio researcher, based on her MSc thesis Traçado Automático de Envoltórias de Esforços em Estruturas Planas devido a Cargas Móveis utilizando um Algoritmo Evolucionário (in English, "Envelopes of Internal Forces due to Load-Trains in Bridges using an Evolution Strategy") for PUC-Rio’s Civil Engineering Deparment in 2005. Gisele Holtz also actively worked in version 2.12 of Ftool.
The consideration of members with shear deformation (Timoshenko beams), introduced in version 3.00 of Ftool, uses analytical solutions that were developed by Rodrigo Bird Burgos, a civil engineer, with bachelor, MSc and PhD degrees from PUC-Rio, and currently an assistant professor at the Rio de Janeiro State University (UERJ).
Many improvements in version 3.00’s graphics interface were made by Antonio Scuri, who is responsible for the development of the IUP user interface system.
The conclusion of version 3.00 was only possible because the author took a sabbatical license during the first semester of 2012 at IST – Instituto Superior Técnico – in Lisbon. This is reason for that version’s name: "Lisboa". The author is very grateful to many IST professors, in particular to José Paulo Moitinho de Almeida, Carlos Tiago Fernandes, and Orlando Pereira, for the fruitful discussions related to Ftool and structural analysis.
The implementation of version 3.01 and the manual’s update was sponsored by Mills ® and had the support of Pedro Kaj Kjellerup Nacht, a PUC-Rio graduate and MSc in Civil Engineering (Structures).
Ftool went through a profound transformation in version 4.00. Its development was transferred to ALIS Engineering and Systems Solutions and an advanced edition for professional use, with a commercial license, was developed. Ftool’s lead developer is engineer Pedro Kaj Kjellerup Nacht.
Ftool version 4.01 Linux executables were created by João Luiz Elias Campos.