Abstract
Since the 1990s, object-oriented programming (OOP) has become the most popular technique among software developers to build medium- and large-scale computer applications. OOP is a programming paradigm used to solve the software problems encountered in many different areas including scientific calculations. In recent years, the Component Object Model (COM) has evolved as a specification and a set of services for creating modular, object-oriented, customizable and upgradeable, distributed applications using a number of programming languages. OOP and COM are used in this research to create a library that implements a thermodynamics model and a set of phase-equilibria algorithms based on an equation of state (EOS). Without a major trade-off in efficiency, this new library has the advantages of modularity, elegance, and easy scalability. The library can be used for further investigation of these or other algorithms and for educational purposes. As a result of this study a complete phase-equilibria and pressure/vapor/temperature (PVT) software package similar to the commercial ones was developed, maintaining the main three premises of OOP: encapsulation, inheritance, and polymorphism. This package includes a Win32 user interface and a library with an efficient implementation of traditional EOS calculations, analytical derivatives of thermodynamic properties, and an isothermal, two-phase flash algorithm at specified pressure and temperature that uses stability analysis and acceleration of the direct-substitution process. Additionally, the architecture of the system includes the implementation of a suite of COM services such as unit-conversion tools, currently used PVT correlations, and a set of methods for easy access to a relational database to store fluids and pure-components data, making the architecture of the system easily upgradeable to a client/server system.
Garcia, Jairo Medina (2002). A complete desktop phase-equilibria software package using object-oriented programming and the component object model. Master's thesis, Texas A&M University. Available electronically from
https : / /hdl .handle .net /1969 .1 /ETD -TAMU -2002 -THESIS -M43.