SOME RECENT DEVELOPMENTS IN INTERACTIVE COMPUTER GRAPHICS FOR 3-D NONLINEAR GEOTECHNICAL FEM ANALYSIS. PROCEEDINGS OF THE SIXTH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON NUMERICAL METHODS IN GEOMECHANICS, 11-15 APRIL 1988, INNSBRUCK, AUSTRIA. VOLUMES 1 - 3

The geotechnical engineering analysis and design process should be creative. Computer graphics can significantly enhance this process by simplifying the overwhelming input and output concerns. This paper provides a status report on the developing computer graphics system for finite element method (fem) analysis at Cornell University. The framework and hardware of the system are discussed first, followed by the preprocessing and postprocessing operations controlling the analysis process. Appropriate screen images from this software are included for illustration. The paper further describes the material and interface modeling capabilities that the system supports to allow practical geotechnical problems to be solved. (Author/TRRL)