Architosh Staff (info@architosh.com)

8 Dec 00

SAP One: Mac Structural Engineering app, product details

Previously we brought to your attention the Macintosh application called SAP One, a structural engineering analysis application developed by an Italian engineer. Recently we wrote asking for more details on the program.

Suitable for All Steel Building Calculations

SAP One is suitable for both steel and prefabricated steel buildings as well as many concrete building calculations as well. At this point the program lacks concrete section check.

Antonino Ficarra, the program author, mentioned that the downloadable examples are mostly true projects of his civil engineering work. He works for a steel prefabrication building company.

Calculation of horizontal and vertical forces on beams, frames, columns, etc.

SAP One has a very general surface loads generator. It works with non-planar surfaces too. You can apply a load to a surface and let SAP One calculate the transmitted load on beams and nodes. When you modify the structure geometry SAP One automatically updates the transmitted loads. You can use surfaces for lateral loads like wind as well. Seismic analysis will be fully functional when Antonino adds dynamic calculation in the future version.

Calculation Reports, Diagrams and Structural Drawings for Building Officials

Antonino regularly uses SAP One for calculation reports to give to building officials. And it can easily generate and print shear, momentum and other structural diagrams. Structural drawings capability will happen in the future version once concrete section check is added.

DWG and DXF Import/Export

At the moment SAP One cannot work well with DWG and DXF file formats due to the fact that the DXF file format is very "implementation dependent", according to Antonino. We understand enough about the DXF file format to know that it is very limited. Textures, patterns and some dimension problems have kept SAP One back in this regard.

US Engineers and SAP One

Antonino mentioned that some US engineers are fully testing SAP One and will send Antonino their critical impressions soon. John Haumann, an engineer in San Antonio, Texas, suggested that SAP One be posted on the ASME Web Site, but Antonino will wait until an English version is out.

Any engineers with foreign language skills who would like to help get SAP One really rolling along here in the States are encouraged to contact Antonino. Currently there are two software distributors (Italian and French) that are in discussions and a French programmer is working on a French version.

We at Architosh wish Antonino all the best with SAP One. It is truly great to see a professional Mac engineer go out and create his ideal application. If only more architects working on the Mac would follow this example. We might have many more programs to choose from!