In developing the new mesh file format, and based on some previous discussion with Roy, a few limitations with the current format have become clear. Specifically, the current mesh format provides no mechanism for specifying the subdomain id, or the p level for a given element (although the latter should probably be associated with an EquationSystems object instead of the mesh). Both of these are features which were added to the library since the format was developed.
At the same time, I don't really want to clutter a file with a subdomain ID for elements when they are identically 0. So, what I am thinking is outlined as follows... Consider the following header: libMesh-0.7.0+ 1 # number of elements 27 # number of nodes . # boundary condition specification file n/a # subdomain id specification file n/a # processor id specification file n/a # p-level specification file .... There are a number of locations in the header for specifying auxiliary files. For example, the boundary condition file is specified as '.', which means the boundary conditions will be read from the current file. Similarly, the 'n/a' means there is no subdomain specification file for the current mesh, although '.' would say read it from this file, and 'foo.sid' would allow it to be read from a separate file. This would allow you to use e.g. the same mesh with different boundary conditions cheaply, or to specify an external partitioning to use for a given mesh. I would think most of the time the specifiers would be either '.' or 'n/a', but upon occasion it may be useful to have external files specify these data. Thoughts?? -Ben ------------------------------------------------------------------------- SF.Net email is sponsored by: The Future of Linux Business White Paper from Novell. From the desktop to the data center, Linux is going mainstream. Let it simplify your IT future. http://altfarm.mediaplex.com/ad/ck/8857-50307-18918-4 _______________________________________________ Libmesh-devel mailing list Libmesh-devel@lists.sourceforge.net https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/libmesh-devel
