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Examples

ForcePAD includes small .fp2 models that can be used as starting points for teaching, demonstrations, and regression testing. The current sample files live in the repository under bin/release/samples/.

Curated example placeholder

Add screenshots, expected result images, and short lesson notes for each example. The first high-value set should cover a cantilever beam, bridge or truss-like domain, stress concentration, topology optimisation, and an image-based model.

Bundled Sample Models

Example File Open Suggested use
Symmetric beam beam_sym.fp2 ▶ Basic bending, support conditions, and symmetry.
Thick beam thick_beam.fp2 ▶ Compare coarse and thick structural domains.
Block block.fp2 ▶ Simple design domain for stress and optimisation experiments.
Demo example demo_example.fp2 ▶ General walkthrough model for demonstrations.
Pantheon pantheon.fp2 ▶ Image-based geometry and architectural form exploration.
Pantheon variants pantheon2.fp2, pantheon3.fp2 ▶ ▶ Variants for comparing edits and responses.

The browser version can open a model straight from a link, so an assignment or a lecture slide can point students at a prepared starting point instead of asking them to download a file and open it by hand. Add a model parameter to the app URL:

https://jonaslindemann.github.io/forcepad/app/?model=models/beam_sym.fp2

Every sample model listed above is published with the app, so models/<file>.fp2 works for any of them — the ▶ Open links in the table are exactly these URLs. If the file cannot be fetched, ForcePAD starts with an empty model and reports the problem.

Linking to Your Own Models

The model value can also be a full https:// address, and it does not have to point at anything in this project. Teachers can prepare their own models and hand out links without needing access to the ForcePAD site — the app simply fetches whatever the link points at.

The simplest route is a public GitHub repository:

  1. Commit your .fp2 file to a public repository (a gist works too).
  2. Open the file on GitHub and copy the raw address — https://raw.githubusercontent.com/<user>/<repo>/<branch>/<path>. The ordinary github.com/.../blob/... page address will not work: it serves a web page rather than the file.
  3. Append it to the app URL:
https://jonaslindemann.github.io/forcepad/app/?model=https://raw.githubusercontent.com/your-name/your-repo/main/models/beam.fp2

Paste the address as it is — no escaping or encoding is needed.

Two things make such a link durable:

  • The repository has to be public. Raw addresses for private repositories require an access token, and those expire.
  • Point at a fixed branch or commit. A link containing /main/ follows the branch, so editing the model later changes what students open. Using a commit id instead of the branch name freezes it.

If a Model Will Not Load

A model hosted somewhere else is downloaded by the browser, which enforces a few rules ForcePAD cannot work around:

  • The host must allow cross-site downloads by sending the Access-Control-Allow-Origin header. GitHub and GitHub Pages do this by default, which is why they are the easy option; an ordinary university or personal web server usually does not, and the model will silently fail to load. If in doubt, ask whoever administers the server for it, or host the file on GitHub instead.
  • The address must be https://. A plain http:// address is blocked because the app itself is served over https.

Note

A model that refuses to load in the browser will still open in the desktop version — these restrictions come from the browser, not from ForcePAD.

From the Desktop Version

The desktop version accepts the same thing on the command line, either as a local file or as an address:

forcepad https://example.org/models/beam.fp2