Preparing an Application

To get the most out of the Application Builder when creating an application, consider these steps and guidelines:

•	Consider what the application should include: What parameters are of interest? What are the outputs that a user would like to see? Plots are useful, but usually some specific numerical results are important, such as a maximum stress, displacement, or temperature.

•	Make a sketch of the user interface and its controls and objects, outlining what types of inputs, menus, buttons, plots, and so on the application should include. Make a layout of the form or forms in the application.

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Create a COMSOL model of the application, including the parameters that you want to use as inputs in the applications and the derived values and plots that you want to use as the outputs and results. To differentiate the derived values and plots, rename the nodes so that they have descriptive names.

•	Use descriptions for all of the parameters that you want to include in the application. You can then select them as inputs in the New Form wizard, which uses the descriptions as labels for the corresponding text fields.

•	Solve the COMSOL model, and consider what studies you want to include in the application to produce the output that is of interest to the users.

•	Save the COMSOL model as a Model MPH-file that you will use as a starting point for the application.

The Application Builder includes built-in tools for tailoring an application that suits most needs. You might also consider whether there are some special aspects of the application that would require coding, and if so, prepare some information about what objects and properties you need to use. The next step is to start the Application Builder.

When using several plots to show various aspects of the solution, consider whether all plot buttons should also recompute the solution. Alternatively, you might use a separate button to compute the solution and just let the plot buttons update the plots using the current solution data.