Using the industry-standard OpenGL^® graphics API, Gridgen's interactivity and 3D graphics are available on a variety of Windows^® (Intel^® and AMD^®), Linux^® (Intel^® and AMD^®), Mac^®, and Unix^® (SGI^®, HP^®, and Sun^®), workstations, all with the same look and feel and transportable Gridgen native file. Gridgen's graphical user interface (GUI) guides engineers through preprocessing, eliminates extraneous menus, and uses a consistent menu system and nomenclature for the entire process, from CAD model import/creation through volume grid generation and analysis software file export. When combined these features make Gridgen easy to learn, easy to use, and easy to remember how to use. Other features of the GUI are:

+ multi-element airfoil

mouse or keyboard operation
"mode-less" image pan, zoom, and rotate
PostScript^®, PNG, BMP and SGI RGB output
HTML-based on-line, context-sensitive help
Heterogeneous license management, allowing "license once, run anywhere"
Common GUI and Gridgen native files across all platforms

Detailed Hardware Requirements

All | Windows | Linux | Mac | HP | SGI | Sun |

+ cyclonic separator

All Platforms

Minimum Requirements:

128 Mbytes RAM
100 Mbytes disk space
OpenGL capable color display
Ethernet card
CD-ROM drive

Recommended Requirements:

3D hardware accelerated OpenGL graphics
double-buffered overlay planes or 24 graphics planes

Windows

Gridgen supports Windows on both AMD and Intel.

Intel IA-32 Architecture
Microsoft Windows Vista and XP (Gridgen may operate properly on Windows 95, 98, NT, ME, and 2000 but this operation is unsupported.)
at least 1024x768 resolution in High Color (16 bit) Display Mode
Compatible Graphics Acclerators*

ELSA Gloria II
FireGL 1
3DLabs Oxygen VX1
NVIDIA GeForce and Quadro
Diamond Viper 770
Diamond Fire GL 1000 Pro
ATI Rage LT Pro
ATI Radeon 9700 Pro

Graphics Accelerators with Known Problems

ATI Rage Ultra

Linux

Gridgen supports Linux on both AMD and Intel.

Linux installations must include:

libstdc++ libraries
glibc v2.2 libraries
GNU c++ runtime libraries (v2.96+)
XFree86 V4.1
OpenGL

Under RedHat Linux 7.X the specific libraries and the package from which they may be installed are listed below. (For other Linux distributions, we recommend using rpmfind.net to determine which packages to install.)

libGLU.so.1	OpenGL driver
libGL.so.1	OpenGL driver
libGLcore.so.1	OpenGL driver
libpthread.so.0	glibc-2.2.4
libm.so.6	glibc-2.2.4
libc.so.6	glibc-2.2.4
libdl.so.2	glibc-2.2.4
/lib/ld-linux.so.2	glibc-2.2.4
libstdc++-libc6.2-2.so.3	libstdc++-2.96
libXmu.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)
libXext.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)
libX11.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)
libXt.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)
libSM.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)
libICE.so.6	XFree86-libs (4.1)

A recommended hardware configuration is: RedHat Linux 7.1 and version 1.0-1251 of the NVidia XFree86 binary drivers for NVidia-based graphics cards. Customers have reported satisfactory results with the following configuration: RedHat Linux 6.2, ATI Radeon 64 DDR graphics card with X Inside Graphics' graphics driver.

To enable color index overlays for Linux distributions using NVidia graphics cards, the following two options will need to be added to the Device section of the XF86Config file (typically founds in /etc/X11):

Option   "Overlay" "1"
Option   "CIOverlay" "1"

As an example, a full Device section might look like the following:

Section "Device"
   Identifier "Videocard0"
   Driver     "nvidia"
   VendorName "PNY"
   BoardName  "NVIDIA Quadro FX 500"
   VideoRam   131072
   Option     "NoLogo" "1"
   Option     "HWcursor" "1"
   Option     "Overlay" "1"
   Option     "CIOverlay" "1"
EndSection

Problems have been reported when running Gridgen under MesaGL (software acceleration).

Mac

Power Mac G5 Workstations (Intel-based Macs not yet supported)
MacOS X Panther (v10.3)
X11
NVidia GeForce Graphics Accelerator

Hewlett-Packard

HP-UX 11.11 on PA-RISC
Visualize b-, c-, and j-class Unix Workstations
Series 700 Workstations
Visualize fx2, fx4, fx5, fx6, fx10 Graphics

SGI

Prism, Fuel, Onyx2, Onyx, Octane2, Octane, O2, Indigo2, Indy
IRIX 6.5
All Graphics

Sun

UltraSPARC Workstations
Solaris 8
Creator3D, Elite3D, and Expert3D Graphics Accelerators

*Up-to-date graphic accelerator driver software is essential for proper operation of Gridgen.