1 Introduction
OctaveFEMM is a Matlab toolbox that allows for the operation of Finite Element Method Magnet-
ics (FEMM) via a set of Matlab functions. The toolbox works with Octave, a Matlab clone.
When OctaveFEMM starts up a FEMM process, the usual FEMM user interface is displayed
and is fully functional. The user then has the choice of accomplishing modeling and analysis tasks
either exclusively through functions implemented by the toolbox, or by a combination of manual
and programmatic operations – whichever is easiest for the task at hand.
The syntax of the OctaveFEMM toolbox closely mirrors that of FEMM’s existing Lua scripting
language interface associated with FEMM v4.2. However, there are some differences between the
Lua functions and the analogous Octave/Matlab implementations:
• All strings are enclosed in single quotes, rather than double quotes as in Lua.
• Functions in Lua that have no arguments require a set of empty parentheses after the function
name (e.g.
mi analyze()
). In Octave or Matlab, no parentheses should be used needed (e.g.
mi analyze
with the OctaveFEMM toolbox).
• Several commands have also been added to OctaveFEMM that have no analog in Lua. These
commands streamline the drawing of new geometries with the OctaveFEMM toolbox, as
well is the collection of data from solutions.
Perhaps the most remarkable difference between Lua and OctaveFEMM, however, is due to
the matrix-oriented nature of Octave/Matlab. In just about any OctaveFEMM function in which
it would be desiable to enter an array of points such that multiple copies of an operation are per-
formed, OctaveFEMM will correctly interpret the input perform the requested operation on every
element in the array. In addition, for any function in which the coordinates of a point are required,
that point can be specified as an array with two elements instead of specifying each element sepa-
rately. In functions that require the specification of multiple points, those points can be entered as
an array of two-element arrays.
2 Installation and Startup
2.1 Installation for Matlab and Octave 3
The OctaveFEMM distribution is automatically installed with FEMM 4.2 in the
mfiles
subdirec-
tory. The absolute directory is typically
c:\Program Files\femm42\mfiles
. To use Octave-
FEMM with Octave or Matlab, this path needs to be added to the program’s search path. To add
this path to the search path, type the following lines at the Matlab or Octave 3.X.X command
prompt:
addpath(’c:\\progra˜1\\femm42\\mfiles’);
savepath;
Alternatively, in Matlab, the interactive
pathtool
command can be used to add the
mfiles
directory to the search path.
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