about Unstructured Meshes

[Matthew Knepley]

On 3/2/07, Jianing Shi <jianings at gmail.com> wrote:
> Well, let me rephrase my question.  So the mesh support in PETSc
> already includes the functionality of partitioning meshes, I guess,
> using ParMetis, is that the case?  Something that an end user need to
> worry about is really how to generate a mesh that is tailored towards
> his/her application.

It can use a range of partioners, like Chaco for instance.

> I am trying to write a library on top of PETSc meshes that will
> generate meshes according to some neurophysiology.  I would like to
> know what are the mesh generate softwares out there that will
> interface nicely with PETSc, or if it makes sense for me to write my
> own?  Just would like to understand more about the data structure in
> the PETSc ALE::Mesh classes.  Is there any tutorial out there apart
> from looking at the source code in the mesh directory?

1) No, it makes no sense for you to write a mesh generator

2) In 2D, Triangle. In 3d, the only free things are TetGen and Netgen. I support
    TetGen. Hopefully, CMU will release its MG soon.

There is a tutorial on the website.

> I am currently using the petsc-2.3.2-p3.  Is there any new
> functionality about meshes in the development version?

All the working stuff is in petsc-dev.

  Matt

> Jianing
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