[vox] Luke Peterson will talk about PyDy (open source dynamics software) tomorrow in Bainer 1062 @ 4:10 pm

[Jason Moore]

Hi,

Dale (Luke) Peterson will be giving a talk on PyDy, an open source software
package for multi-body dynamics, tomorrow in* Bainer 1062 @ 4:10pm*.

    PyDy <http://www.pydy.org> is an open source software tool written in
Python <http://www.python.org> for the purpose of studying the
classical mechanics. Its is an ongoing project, but the initial development
was funded through
a Google Summer of Code 2009 <http://code.google.com/soc/> project. In this
talk, I will discuss the motivations for PyDy,
how it got its start, it’s current capabilities, and what the future plans
are.
    PyDy enables symbolic formulation of the equations of motion of
mechanical systems. It
it implements Kane’s method for deriving the equations of motion, and uses
the symbolic ma-
nipulator Sympy <http://code.google.com/p/sympy/> as the core for all
symbolic operations. Some of the useful features of PyDy
include output of symbolically derived expressions in LaTeX form, generation
of functions li-
brary (EOMS, reaction forces, energy, constraint equations, etc.) for a
system, and convenient
functions for producing 3D animations. All operations are done within the
Python environment,
which allows for a Matlab-like interactive workspace for manipulating the
equations, numerical
integration, plotting, and OpenGL rendered 3D animations.
    The central feature of PyDy is to automate the tedious booking of
transformations that are
necessary for the kinematic and dynamic description of multi-body systems.
Expressing vectors
in any coordinate system is trivial with PyDy, as well the determination of
angular velocity of a
frame or velocity of a point with respect to any other frame.
Differentiation of vector quantities
in rotating reference frames is also handled automatically.
    The use of PyDy will be demonstrated on two simple systems: the double
pendulum, and
the rolling torus. It is our goal that PyDy be a viable teaching tool for
statics and dynamics at
the undergraduate and graduate level, as well for performing interesting
research on multi-body
dynamical systems.
    For those interested, you can find installation instructions, browse the
source, and see ex-
amples here:
                                http://github.com/hazelnusse/pydy

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Sports Biomechanics Lab, UC Davis (http://biosport.ucdavis.edu)
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