Pointwise is solving one of the top problems facing engineering analysts today: mesh generation for computational fluid dynamics (CFD), and other numerical simulations. The company has been a premier supplier of mesh generation software and services to the engineering analysis community since 1994.  With its staff’s decades of expertise in development, support, and application of robust software for real-world meshing challenges, Pointwise has helped industry, government, and academic clients worldwide bridge the "design - analysis gap."

Large manufacturing firms and research organizations worldwide, including Northrop-Grumman, Rolls Royce Allison and Lockheed Martin rely on Pointwise to help them create better designs and optimize performance through computer simulations. Examples of customer benefits include helping minimize drag on aircraft or enabling better fuel economy in a new line of gas turbine engines.

The Challenge

Pointwise launched a project to develop a new version of its successful Gridgen mesh generation tool (CFD) concentrating on a fully-optimized user experience.  To reduce their workload, customers had requested a more streamlined and automated means of interacting with the Gridgen mesh tool software and a modern and standard-looking interface to reduce the software’s learning curve. The company also wanted to ensure that its software architecture looked sleeker and was designed to take full advantage of the capabilities of today’s computer hardware.  Pointwise had been relying on a user interface library initially developed in 1987 that lacked native look-and-feel across platforms and needed polishing for an up-to-date appearance.

The Solution

Qt provided a broad scope of tools that Pointwise quickly and effectively implemented into the workflow for each particular task while at the same time easily supporting multiple platforms with their native look-and-feel. With Qt, Pointwise was able to develop a cross platform OpenGL software application by providing a broad spectrum of controls and views, including model-view structures for tree and table views. This freed the developers from dealing with such platform-specific issues as control sets, windowing nuances and look and feel and allowed them to concentrate on application development. Qt has also enabled Pointwise to run Tk scripts and common API for multi-threading and GUI components, which it sees as major advantages.

The Value

By choosing Qt, Pointwise estimates that at least a year of development was saved, releasing the product to market faster than with other potential solutions. It also resulted in a reduced number of developers working on platform-specific coding, which saved on costs and made it possible for Pointwise to use its resources more effectively. The choice of Qt as the application framework has made Pointwise’s solution a success with its customers who rave about the new product’s consistent look and feel and the ease of implementation.

 “By using Qt for our new graphical user interface, we were immediately able to have a contemporary appearance in the native style of each platform our customers wanted and the power to produce the highest quality grids available.”