WARNING: This page describes an outdated program code! Please use the old DXA code only in case you want to reproduce old analysis results. For future work, the new Crystal Analysis Tool should be used instead, which is available from the author upon request.

The DXA package contains the C++ source code of the analysis tool, a readme.txt file with build and usage instructions, and a couple of Python scripts for post-processing/conversion of output files.

Note that the DXA tool is not Open Source, that is, even though you are given permission to use the source code and the program free of charge, you are not allowed to redistribute them. See the readme.txt file for complete license terms.

To get you started with the DXA tool, I wrote a few tutorials that explain its usage:

Tutorial: Getting started with the DXA tool
Tutorial: How line tracing works
Tutorial: How to analyze a sequence of snapshots

Download newest DXA source code package
Release 1.3.6, 20-Jan-2014, 140 KB

Version history

Release 1.3.6 (20-Jan-2014)

• Fixed a compilation error in Smoothing.cpp reported by newer C++ compilers.

Release 1.3.5 (26-Sep-2011)

• Updated the source code of the LAMMPS on-the-fly analysis module to work with the current version of LAMMPS. Will no longer compile with older LAMMPS versions (< 24Sep11).

Release 1.3.4 (05-Aug-2011)

• Fixed a small bug that was introduced in version 1.3.3, causing an assertion error in some cases during primary dislocation search.

Release 1.3.3 (21-Jul-2011)

• Improved the accuracy of world-space Burgers vector calculation. The new algorithm should give somewhat better results if the crystal is highly distorted around the dislocation. Computed lattice-space Burgers vectors are not affected by this; they are always exact.
• Fixed assertion error that occurred in rare cases when atoms are located exactly on the simulation cell boundary.

Release 1.3.1 (02-May-2011)

• LAMMPS snapshot parser supports periodic boundary condition flags output by recent LAMMPS versions.
• Extra defect surfaces that have been introduced by DXA to eliminate disclinations are now marked in the surface VTK file.
• Fixed bug in the LAMMPS module that affected triclinic simulation cells.

Release 1.3.0 (13-Apr-2011)

• Fixed bug in LAMMPS dump parser when reading triclinic simulation cells.
• Added parser for MD++ snapshot files.
• Added the -scale command line option, which allows you to scale/deform the entire simulation box prior to analysis, for instance, to subtract large uniaxial elastic deformations, which disturb the common neighbor analysis.
• Improved recognition of dislocation junctions in highly defective crystal regions.

Release 1.2.9 (26-Jan-2011)

• LAMMPS module
• Fixed compilation error on Mac OSX 10.6.
• Fixed loading of LAMMPS files with reduced coordinates.

Release 1.2.8 (14-Jan-2011)

• Command line switch -dumpinput has been renamed to -dumpatoms.
• When using the -dumpsf switch, HCP atoms in an FCC crystal are classified as forming either intrinsic stacking faults (ISF) or coherent twin boundaries (TB). This per-atom information can be output with the -dumpatoms switch. The VTK file written by the -dumpsf switch now contains additional data fields (intrinsic_stacking_fault and twin_boundary) that quantify for each stacking fault polygon its likeliness of being an ISF or a TB respectively.

Release 1.2.7 (07-Jan-2011)

• Command line parameters controlling the Burgers circuit size limit have been renamed. See this page for a discussion of the new parameters.
• Fixed compilation issue on Mac OS X 10.5.

Release 1.2.6 (05-Jan-2011)

• Renamed executable from DXA_debug to DXA.
• Fixed various build and compilation issues on older operating systems.
• Added code for a LAMMPS module that enables dislocations analysis on the fly. Documentation of this feature will follow.

Release 1.2.5 (13-Oct-2010)

• Added support for LAMMPS dump files with reduced atomic coordinates (xs, ys, and zs columns)
• Fixed compilation error on MacOS X 10.6.

Release 1.2.4 (10-Oct-2010)

• First public release