Stardis Release Notes git repository

Version 0.11.1

Corrects the writing of the RNG state when resolving a probe temperature on the boundary: the RNG state was written to the file in which the RNG state was read or it was not written at all, depending on whether the RNG state to be read was defined or not, respectively.
Corrects the emissivity of a programmable Dirichlet boundary condition: it was set to a constant value, not the programmable value.
Minor update of stardis man page typesetting.

Version 0.11

Programmable properties

Custom sampling of conductive paths. On programmable solids, users can now define the new stardis_sampling_conductive_path function, in which they can write their own sampling process. As input, the function takes a path whose spatio-temporal position lies within the programmable solid. Once the path has been sampled, this position is updated and can be either within the solid if the initial condition is reached, or at the boundary, i.e. at a boundary condition. Stardis then continues the path sampling procedure in relation to the returned state.
Addition of the property name as the first argument of the input string sent to the programmable data creation functions. Not only is this useful information, it also respects the convention of program arguments. In this way, the standard getopt function can be used directly to analyze them.
Addition of symbolic constants to the public API for programmable properties. The constants added are those defining an unknown temperature, and constants characterizing null flux or null volumic power.

Manual pages

Document the -n option which defines the number of realisations. Its documentation was missing from the stardis manual page.
Correction of the title of the stardis-output manual page. It was defined as stardis-input.
Updated the layout of the stardis-output manual page. When converted to HTML, the width of the columns changed from one list to another, resulting in an unstructured layout.

Miscellaneous

Correction of the Dirichlet boundary condition definition. No reference temperature was defined on a surface oriented towards a fluid and on which a Dirichlet boundary condition was imposed (keywords T_BOUNDARY_FOR_SOLID[_PROG]). Stardis therefore notified an error and rejected radiative trajectories reaching such interfaces without a reference temperature. From now on, its reference temperature is implicitly defined as the set temperature value.
Removal of a warning message when calculating a list of boundary probes. It incorrectly warned that the side of the boundary on which the probe was located was not defined.

Version 0.10.1

Add a pkg-config file to support the use of Stardis header files such as the one declaring function profiles for programmable properties.

Version 0.10

New conduction algorithm

Addition of a new algorithm for sampling a potentially unsteady conductive path. The new -a option lets you select the algorithm to be used, i.e. either the sphere delta algorithm used until now (which is still the default algorithm), or the new Walk on Sphere algorithm (WoS).

This new algorithm samples an unbiased diffuse trajectory in a solid with Dirichlet boundary conditions, unbiased with respect to what numerical accuracy can account for. Its coupling with other boundary or connection conditions behaves as with the delta sphere algorithm, i.e. the solution is exact when the length of the trajectory used as a first-order approximation tends towards 0.

Currently, when using WoS, the initial condition must be constant for the solid. The power density is also taken into account, but cannot vary in time and space.

External spherical source

An external spherical source can be added to the scene using the new stardis-input keyword SPHERICAL_SOURCE. Once defined, it is considered as a new boundary condition whose contribution is calculated at the solid/fluid interfaces in the form of an external net flux.

The external net flux is calculated by evaluating the direct and diffuse part of the incident flux due to the external source. The diffuse part of the flux manages not only the radiation from the external source that reaches the interface after one or more reflections, but also the external radiation scattered in the environment, here simply represented by a diffuse-radiance parameter.

An external spherical source is defined by its position, radius, power and diffuse radiance. While the radius is constant, all other parameters can be programmed using the SPHERICAL_SOURCE_PROG keyword. In doing so, the user can provide a shared object as input, enabling him to define a time-dependent power and position, and a diffuse radiance that also depends on the direction along which the sampled trajectory reaches the environment.

Making surface radiative properties source-dependent

Emissivity and specular fraction can now be varied according to the type of source (internal or external). This is only possible using programmable properties (H_BOUNDARY_FOR_FLUID_PROG, HF_BOUNDARY_FOR_SOLID_PROG and SOLID_FLUID_PROG). Properties are otherwise assumed to be the same for all sources.

Make the radiative environment programmable

Addition of the TRAD_PROG keyword, which allows the user to define a radiative temperature and a reference radiative temperature that depend on a direction.

Parallelize the resolutions of multiple boundary probes

Add the -L option to calculate multiple boundary probes at once. Stardis will then parallelize the probe list calculations, rather than each probe calculation one after the other. Using this option is therefore more advantageous in terms of load distribution when the number of boundary probes to be evaluated is large compared to the cost of calculating a single probe (option -P).

Allow relative temperatures

Allow to perform calculations relative to a given temperature T. In this case, the temperatures managed by Stardis would be relative to T and could therefore be negative, since they would express a deviation from T. It should be noted that reference temperatures must always be positive, i.e. expressed in the absolute domain. Finally, we emphasize that relative calculations only make sense in linear situations, i.e. negative temperatures are not valid for systems with non-linear radiative exchanges (i.e. option -o whose argument is greater than one).

This is a file format break that users must take into account. Until now, negative temperatures were considered unknown, whereas they are now valid. For example, an interface with a negative temperature could be considered adiabatic, whereas it is now a Dirichlet boundary condition. In other words, the same data could define completely different systems before and after this version.

Use POSIX make as a build system

The build procedure is now written in POSIX make instead of CMake. In addition to the features already provided by its CMake alternative, the Makefile supports the use of static libraries and provides an uninstall target. In any case, the main motivation behind its writing is to use a good old well-established standard with simple features, available on all UNIX systems, thus simplifying its portability and support while being much lighter

Proof-reading and editing manual pages

Write the man pages directly in mdoc's roff macros, instead of using the asciidoc markup language as a source for man pages.

Unlike writing manuals with man's roff macros, and even more so with asciidoc, mdoc macros take care of layout, font handling and all the other typesetting details which, by construction, guarantee the consistency of all manuals without leaving the responsibility to the individual author. This also facilitates translation into other formats and documentation tools. These are the main reasons for writing manual pages with mdoc macros.

A complete re-reading of the manual pages was carried out during the translation into mdoc, with several corrections and rewrites to make the manual clearer.

Version 0.9

Programmable properties

Until now, physical properties as well as boundary and connection conditions were constant in time and space. In this version, they can be programmed, i.e. they are variables returned by functions implemented in user-defined libraries and submitted as dynamically loaded input libraries when Stardis starts. User libraries must also provide create/release functions that are invoked at start-up to allow users to load their data and build the internal data structures required by their libraries at run-time.

The stardis-input file format has been updated to provide a set of new _PROG suffixed keywords used to define these programmed properties and conditions (e.g. T_BOUNDARY_FOR_SOLID_PROG or H_BOUNDARY_FOR_FLUID_PROG)

Miscellaneous

Addition of the keyword HF_BOUNDARY_FOR_SOLID which allows to impose a flux on a boundary with another condition. For example, a net flux can be defined in addition to a convective exchange and a radiative transfer.
Correct the definition of a net flux as a boundary condition: it might not be defined on the right side of the interface.
Correct the "subpath type" data of the output paths: as we attach the segment type to the vertices, we need to locate the type changes along the path on zero length segments, otherwise the colouring will show a misleading colour gradient.
Replace the Mersenne Twister random number generator with Threefry: the former is much less efficient at rejecting random numbers than the latter, which is designed for this purpose, a feature on which parallel random number generations depend heavily

Version 0.8

Add a new option to support non-linear radiative transfer computations.
Changes in input file's format to support non-linear radiative transfer by adding reference temperatures on interfaces.
Add optional support for MPI (must be enabled at compile time, default is OFF).
Change random number generator type to use Threefry.
Change the format of binary Green files. A new public header file is now installed that describes all types involved in binary Green files.
Fix a crash on an exit-on-error execution path.
Fix parsing of command-line options.

Version 0.7.2

Fix the binary file format of the green function: the fileformat has been updated without incrementing the version of the serialised data.

Version 0.7.1

Fix debug build.

Version 0.7

Remove the boundary condition T_BOUNDARY_FOR_FLUID: it was exactly the same than H_BOUNDARY_FOR_FLUID that should now be used instead.
Sets the required version of Star-SampPling to 0.12. This version fixes compilation errors with gcc 11 but introduces API breaks.

Version 0.6

Add thermal contact resistances.
Add serialization for random generator's state.
Bugfixes in arguments parsing.
Fix Green output file padding.

Version 0.5.1

Fix a memleak
Add a file format version in binary Green files.
Man improvement.

Version 0.5

Ensure C89 compliance.
New output format for infra-red rendering.
Use new stardis-solver 0.11.
Replace fixed dates by time-ranges as time arguments for computations.
Allow unsteady Green's function computations.
Model files now include scale parameter.

Version 0.4

Improve C99 compliance.
Build on Windows systems.
Use new stardis-solver 0.5.
Transition to cmake to manage builds.

Version 0.3.2

Add the solve_probe_boundary feature. The solve_probe_boundary VS solve_probe selection is automated according the probe-geometry distance. solve_probe_boundary is called for probe points closer than 2.1 delta from geometry.
Add flux boundary conditions.

Version 0.3.1

Add radiative transfer computations. To achieve this, media gain 2 new parameters:

emissivity;
specular_fraction.

Version 0.3

Upgrade stardis-solver to v0.3.
Add volumic power sources on solids;
Allow to use the fp_to_meter parameter of the stardis-solver solve function;
Add a dump geometry feature. It outputs the geometry as it is sent to stardis-solver in VTK format, together with the front and back media and boundary conditions information.

Version 0.1

Allow probe computations on conductive-only thermal systems.
Allow Dirichlet and h.dT boundary conditions.