Introduction
The role and effective use of computer software is a continuing problem
in undergraduate education. There is a fine line between the use of programs
which can solve complicated problems and much simpler programs, perhaps even
written by the students themselves. This problem was discussed by Agnone in
an ASEE Paper several years ago (Agnone, 1993). The large industrial level programs are
often hard to learn to use and are treated by the students as black boxes,
where they see little connection between the answers that the codes produce
and the physics being used in the code (Mason, 1994). However, most students cannot write
a program in the design class and then have time to use it effectively to
solve sophisticated problems. None of the teachers could either! One of
the possibilities is to purchase problem specific software for the class.
However, in general it's difficult to get information on the codes that
are available. This paper provides a review of the experience I've had
in developing a design class computing system and describes a number of
programs that might be appropriate for use in an aircraft design class.
It is not only intended to provide useful information for other design
teachers, but also to identify codes that can be used throughout the
aerospace curriculum.
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