11.4 Installation

You can use a simpler syntax to start an application that has been installed at a site. Installing an application involves the following steps:

Add an entry to the abaqus_dir/site/abaqus.app file, where abaqus_dir is the name of the directory in which ABAQUS is installed. To determine the location of abaqus_dir at your site, type abaqus whereami at the operating system prompt.
The format of entries in the abaqus.app file is
```
applicationName cae | viewer -custom startupScript
```
where applicationName is the name that the user must specify on the command line to start the application.
- The second parameter determines the type of token that the application will check out—cae or viewer.
- startupScript is the name of the startup script without any file extension. The script must reside in a directory specified in the PYTHONPATH environment variable. applicationName and startupScript can be the same.
Edit the abaqus_dir/site/abaqus.aev file. You must add the directory that contains the customization script to the definition of the PYTHONPATH environment variable. By convention, customization scripts are located in directories underneath abaqus_dir/customApps. You should add your directory near to the end of the PYTHONPATH definition, just prior to the current directory (.). This will ensure that you do not override any existing settings in the PYTHONPATH definition.
To keep the path to your application portable and generic, you should use an environment variable to specify the root of the path. For a standard ABAQUS installation, the $ABA_HOME environment variable refers to the same directory as abaqus_dir. As a result, you can use the $ABA_HOME environment variable to specify the directory that contains your customization script; for example,
```
$ABA_HOME/customApps/myApp
```
For example, to include the myApp directory shown above in the PYTHONPATH, you should change the PYTHONPATH definition in abaqus.aev from this
```
PYTHONPATH 
$ABA_HOME/cae/Python/Lib:$ABA_HOME/cae/Python/Obj:
$ABA_HOME/cae/exec/lbr:.:$PYTHONPATH
```
to this
```
PYTHONPATH 
$ABA_HOME/cae/Python/Lib:$ABA_HOME/cae/Python/Obj:
$ABA_HOME/cae/exec/lbr:$ABA_HOME/customApps/myApp:
.:$PYTHONPATH
```
There are syntax differences between UNIX systems and Windows systems. By default, ABAQUS uses UNIX syntax and automatically converts the UNIX syntax to Windows syntax if the application is run on a Windows platform. However, if you need to specify the drive letter of your path on a Windows system, you must use Windows syntax. To use Windows syntax, you must make the following changes to the entire PYTHONPATH line:

UNIX Windows
: ;
/ \
$NAME %NAME%
The following example shows an abaqus.aev file that refers to a drive letter and has been modified to run on a Windows system:
```
ABA_PATH $ABA_HOME:$ABA_HOME/cae

PYTHONPATH
%ABA_HOME%\cae\Python\Lib;%ABA_HOME%\cae\Python\Obj;
%ABA_HOME%\cae\exec\lbr;d:\boltApp1;.;%PYTHONPATH%

ABA_LIBRARY_PATH
$ABA_HOME/cae/ABA_SELECT:
$ABA_HOME/cae/exec/lbr:$ABA_HOME/cae/Python/Obj/lbr:
$ABA_HOME/cae/External/Acis:$ABA_HOME/cae/External:
$ABA_HOME/cae/External/ebt:$ABA_HOME/exec
```
Use the following syntax to start your application:
```
abaqus applicationName
```

UNIX	Windows
`:`	`;`
`/`	`\`
`$NAME`	`%NAME%`