CFDLab

A terminal-first CAE orchestrator. You enter parameters; CFDLab passes them to the CAD, meshing, solver, and post-processing programs you already have installed, and re-runs only the steps your change affected.

CFDLab draws no CAD, generates no mesh, and solves no equations. It is the conductor, not the orchestra. Gmsh meshes, SU2 solves, ParaView renders — CFDLab decides what to run, with which parameters, and in what order. Think ANSYS Workbench's dependency behaviour, in a terminal, over open-source tools.

Install

pip install cfdlab

The orchestrator is stdlib-only — no compiled wheels, nothing to break. The scientific stack is optional, and only needed for the analysis subpackages:

pip install "cfdlab[numerical]"     # numpy, scipy, pandas
pip install "cfdlab[geometry]"      # gmsh, meshio, build123d
pip install "cfdlab[visualization]" # matplotlib, pyvista
pip install "cfdlab[all]"           # everything above

CFDLab ships no CAE software. Install Gmsh, SU2, FreeCAD, or OpenFOAM yourself and point CFDLab at them.

Quick start

Describe your case in one file:

[parameters.mesh]
size = 0.01

[parameters.solve]
mach = 0.3

[backends.gmsh]
command = ["gmsh", "wing.step", "-clmax", "{mesh.size}", "-3", "-o", "mesh.su2"]

[backends.su2]
command = ["SU2_CFD", "case.cfg"]

[[nodes]]
id = "mesh"
stage = "mesh"
backend = "gmsh"
produces = ["mesh.su2"]

[[nodes]]
id = "solve"
stage = "solve"
backend = "su2"
depends_on = ["mesh"]
consumes = ["mesh.su2"]
produces = ["flow.dat"]

Then drive it:

cfdlab-orchestrator project.toml

cfdlab> doctor                # is every program actually on PATH?
cfdlab> run                   # mesh, then solve
cfdlab> set mesh.size 0.005   # only mesh and solve re-run — CAD is untouched
cfdlab> resume                # continue after a crash; keep the finished mesh

Adding a program means writing its command line. Removing one means deleting that line. No CFDLab code changes.

What it does

Documentation

Full user guide — bilingual (Tiếng Việt + English), covering project files, connecting your installed software, presets, units, and every command.

Beyond the orchestrator

The repository also contains research subpackages for geometry, airfoils, meshing, and SU2 automation. These need the extras above and are at varying maturity; the orchestrator is the part that is packaged and documented for use.

Project status

v1.2.0, in development. 2007 automated tests. Python 3.12+. Linux.

License

MIT