User Guides

In Construction

This page is still a work in progress. We are aiming to bring in the old documentation we have from blueCFD-Core 2.3-1, but the objective is to contribute as much as possible to the openfoamwiki.net website, so that everyone can contribute.

Reminder: blueCFD-Core provides ports of OpenFOAM (the one from the OpenFOAM Foundation) for running directly on Windows, therefore the official OpenFOAM Foundation User Guides should also work with our ports.

Table of content:

• How to Install blueCFD-Core
• Getting started with blueCFD-Core
• Instructions for source code developers
• Building community projects with blueCFD-Core
• Graphical User Interface (GUI)

How to Install blueCFD-Core

A short video tutorial is available at blueCFD-Core: Install How-To @ YouTube for blueCFD-Core 2016-1 and is shown below as well:

Notes:

• The installation steps are very similar for blueCFD-Core 2017 and 2020, therefore this video is still representative.

• If you already have 2016-1 installed, you can update by running the installer for 2016-2 and use the same installation steps. The installer should inherit the installation settings on its own.

  • The same will happen if you installed blueCFD-Core 2017-1 first and want to install 2017-2 later on.

Getting started with blueCFD-Core

A 40 minute video tutorial is available at blueCFD-Core: OpenFOAM® tutorial 1 How-To @ YouTube and is shown below as well:

Instructions for source code developers

If you’re developping or building OpenFOAM technology from source code, then check the instructions already available on our wiki.

Building community projects with blueCFD-Core

We are gradually adding ports of popular community projects to blueCFD-Core.

Please follow the respective wiki pages for the project you want to build:

• Building swak4Foam with blueCFD Core

Graphical User Interface (GUI)

blueCFD-Core does not provide a GUI for using OpenFOAM, but there are already several GUIs developed by others that use blueCFD-Core:

• Open Source:

  • CFDOF, which is an addon for FreeCAD, started working with blueCFD-Core 2016-1; it’s based on openSim, which is also an addon for FreeCAD.

• Commercial (in order of development activity):

  • DHCAE Tools CastNet has worked on Windows with blueCFD-Core since 2009-10, namely when blueCFD-Core was originally launched as blueCFD 1.6-1.

  • Eddy3D add-on for Rhino CAD works with blueCFD-Core 2017 and 2020. This add-on is free, but it also depends on Rhino CAD 3D which is paid.

  • MantiumFlow - CFD Simulation Software by MantiumCAE works with blueCFD-Core 2016 ad 2017.

  • Butterfly add-on for Rhino CAD can be a bit confusing regarding licenses, namely that Rhino CAD 3D is a closed source paid product, but the Butterfly add-on is open source.

Note: Other GUIs used blueCFD-Core in the past, but are no longer using it (September 2024).