While most of the software resulted from a careful design, some portions are ``as they are'' only because they were made in a hurry, or because no better way was at hand at the moment they were made. The input format partially reflects the development of the software. Whenever changes in the input format and in the syntax of existing parts are required, an effort will be attempted to make it as much backward compatible as possible, or at least reliable diagnostics and error checking will be put in place that warns for possible erroneous inputs related to a change in the input format.
At present the input of MBDyn already warns for many possible errors and makes as many cross-checks as possible on the consistency of the data. Nearly every warning and error issue shows the line of the input file where the error occurred.
This document will be subjected to changes, so be sure you always have a release that is aligned with the version of the code you're running.
For any question or problem, to fix typos, bugs, for comments and suggestions, please contact the users' mailing list
mbdyn-users@mbdyn.org
Please note that you need to subscribe to be allowed to post to the list. Posting is public, so please only post information not subjected to distribution restrictions.
Mailing list subscription information is available on the web site
http://www.aero.polimi.it/mbdyn/
As an alternative, you can directly contact the Developers' Team:
Pierangelo Masarati, MBDyn Development Team Dipartimento di Ingegneria Aerospaziale Politecnico di Milano via La Masa 34, 20156 Milano, Italy Fax: +39 02 2399 8334 E-mail: mbdyn@aero.polimi.it Web: http://www.aero.polimi.it/mbdyn/
This manual is also available online at
http://www.aero.polimi.it/masarati/MBDyn-input/manual/index.html
Make sure you use the manual that refers to the version of MBDyn that you are using; from MBDyn 1.2 on, the input manual is marked with the same version number of the package.
The website http://www.aero.polimi.it/mbdyn/ may advertise different versions of the manual, including those related to past releases and a HEAD or -devel version, which refers to current development; this can be useful to check whether the current development may address problems you are having. Moreover, since the updating of the manual is not as prompt as required to keep pace with code releases, the -devel manual may describe features that are already in the latest release but not yet documented in that release's manual.