Release Notes: Altair Feko 2020.1.2

Altair Feko 2020.1.2 is available with new features, corrections and improvements. This version (2020.1.2) is a patch release that should be applied to an existing 2020 installation.

Feko is a powerful and comprehensive 3D simulation package intended for the analysis of a wide range of electromagnetic radiation and scattering problems. Applications include antenna design, antenna placement, microstrip antennas and circuits, dielectric media, scattering analysis, electromagnetic compatibility studies including cable harness modelling and many more.

WinProp is the most complete suite of tools in the domain of wireless propagation and radio network planning. With applications ranging from satellite to terrestrial, from rural via urban to indoor radio links, WinProp’s innovative wave propagation models combine accuracy with short computation times.

newFASANT complements Altair’s high frequency electromagnetic software tool (Altair Feko) for general 3D EM field calculations, including, among others, special design tools tailored for specific applications like complex radomes including FSS, automated design of reflectarrays and ultra-conformed reflector antennas, analysis of Doppler effects, ultrasound systems including automotive or complex RCS, and antenna placement problems. Advanced solver technologies like the MoM combined with the characteristic basis functions (CBFS), PO/GO/PTD, GTD/PO and MLFMM parallelised through MPI/OpenMP, being some of them especially efficient for the analysis of electrically very large problems.

Feko 2020.1.2 Release Notes

The most notable extensions and improvements to Feko are listed by component.

CADFEKO

Features

  • Added thirteen new antennas to the component library, including a quadrifilar helix, E-plane and H-plane horns as well as notched and circularly polarised slot antennas.
  • Extended export to I-DEAS universal format (.unv file) when exporting media information:
    • to take into account face normals (face front/back medium) when exporting media information;
    • to export layered dielectric face media.

Resolved Issues

  • Resolved a problem affecting model mesh parts where coatings and layered dielectric properties were not included in the simulation. The relevant CO and SK cards were not written out to the .pre file for mesh parts.
  • Resolved an issue where faces with layered anisotropic dielectric properties were not correctly included in the model for simulation. Existing models should be meshed and saved for the properties to be applied.
  • Resolved a defect where .pre file entries for loads or voltage sources were not always written out correctly for multi-configuration models where entities were the same between configurations. This could have resulted in missing data in POSTFEKO.

POSTFEKO

Feature

  • Extended unit support when importing results from HDF5 files in the DRE format. The degree, Ohm and micro symbols are now supported for these imports.

Resolved Issues

  • Resolved an issue with the parameter sweep script which resulted in a frequency point mismatch error when sweeping a model with only a single frequency.
  • Resolved an issue where GetDataSet could return too many untracked characteristic modes. The data that got returned for the additional modes were meaningless and the values could be different when running GetDataSet multiple times.
  • Added support for W/Hz unit conversions. This resolves an assertion that failed when enabling trace maths, using the custom unit of W/Hz and changing the vertical axis unit.
  • Resolved an assertion that fails when using the multiplication operator (*) in unit expressions.

Solver

Resolved Issues

  • Fixed a bug that resulted in large memory usage when solving a model excited by a plane wave looping over multiple angles of incidence.
  • Fixed a bug that led to an internal error during the cable cross-section meshing phase for a pre-defined coaxial cable that is treated as a child cross-section within a larger bundle.
  • Fixed a bug that resulted in longer near field computation times.
  • Fix a bug that suppressed realised gain export in far field result data for models containing passive sources, for example passive waveguide ports, in addition to a single active port-based source.

WinProp 2020.1.2 Release Notes

The most notable extensions and improvements to WinProp are listed by component.

ProMan

Features

  • The data rate and throughput are now computed based on the MIMO condition number for MIMO network planning projects simulated using ray tracing models.
  • Accelerated predictions with IRT in indoor scenarios.
  • Databases pre-processed in area mode can now also be used for point mode predictions in ProMan.
  • Reduced memory and storage requirements for pre-processing and simulating a project with a large database with many buildings at the same height.
  • Improved the speed of IRT pre-processing for urban projects with large databases.
  • Implemented the ability to compare results that were computed using different databases. This can be useful when comparing results for databases that were pre-processed using different settings. A warning will be given when the databases are not identical.
  • Measurements assigned to a transmitter are now accessible in the results tree for visualisation.

Resolved Issues

  • Angular spread ASCII results from RunMS were always showing the same value. This is now corrected.
  • Rays of MIMO results computed in RunMS can now be displayed in ProMan.
  • Fixed a bug that resulted in the incorrect consideration of horizontal plates during the line of sight analysis phase of a prediction.
  • Exported .kml files are now placed in the correct location, regardless of zoom level, when viewed in Google Earth.
  • Fix a bug that resulted in wrong LOS results for all but the last time step in a time-varying project.
  • Fixed a difference in computation settings when a ProMan project is opened from the GUI versus by double-clicking the project file. Now both ways of opening a project lead to the same settings and results.
  • Fixed a bug in indoor IRT. It used the material of the main wall for transmission through a sub-division such as a window or a door.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented the display of buildings and results in a particular case. This was for urban scenarios that were pre-processed in point mode, together with results computed at absolute height. Added a Top View display option to show all buildings regardless of prediction height.
  • Fixed a bug that occurred when considering scattering effects from topography in a model solved with the SRT propagation model.
  • Fixed a bug during line-of-sight determination of indoor projects with topography, solved with the dominant path model.
  • Fixed a bug where an inaccurate absolute transmitter height might be written to a result file for a transmitter on top of a building that is located on a slope.
  • Fixed a bug that prevented adjustment of the display height in an urban scenario.
  • Resolved an issue for the vertical plane models in urban scenarios (Knife-edge diffraction, COST231 and ITU-1411) where in seldom cases the computed ray was propagating through buildings.

WallMan

Features

  • Removed the limit on the number of corners of a building for IRT pre-processing. The limit used to be 255.
  • Improved the speed of IRT pre-processing for urban projects with large databases.

Resolved Issues

  • Improved the adjustment of imported vegetation polygons to topography in urban scenarios. The vegetation will follow the topography more naturally, resulting in more accurate consideration of losses within vegetation.
  • Diffraction effects from vertical wedges of horizontal plates are now considered during predictions with the urban IRT model.
  • Fixed a bug that resulted in the 3D view not being available when a bitmap is displayed in 2D view with an urban or indoor database.
  • Fixed a bug in the conversion from OpenStreetMap that resulted in horizontal non-building objects being assigned inaccurate thicknesses.

Application Programming Interface

Features

  • Added support for coherent superposition in projects simulated using the deterministic two ray or urban IRT models with WinPropCLI.
  • Binary result files can now be converted to ASCII files with WinPropCLI.
  • Added support for parallel indoor database IRT pre-processing using the API or WinPropCLI on Linux.
  • The version number of WinPropCLI is now printed to standard output at the beginning of every simulation.
  • Included atmospheric losses in the API.

Resolved Issues

  • Added RunMS support for time-variant scenarios with the API.
  • Updated the C# example of the WinProp API to reflect recent modifications in the API.
  • Improved the parallel efficiency when a project with many transmitters is simulated in parallel using WinPropCLI. Furthermore, added a function (WinProp_Yield_NrOfThreads) to the API that reserves a number of Altair units equivalent to the number of threads. This avoids repeated license checkout calls which might affect performance for parallel simulations across a large number of transmitters.

newFASANT 2020.1.2 Release Notes

The most notable extensions and improvements to newFASANT are listed by component.

GUI

Resolved Issue

  • Removed the Remesh option under Object Properties. Remeshing is now enabled by default for UTD-based modules. For MoM/PO-based modules (MOM, MONCROS, PO, PERIODICAL) the Remesh option can be found under the Meshing tab.

Solver

Resolved Issue

  • Fixed a bug which may have resulted in higher-order reflections not being found in some cases.