Freelance - Simulation Software Developer F/M

Overview

Aquent is looking for a Simulation Software Developer to support one of our clients, a leading global sportswear brand headquartered in Germany, with a high-impact mission at the crossroads of product innovation, virtual testing, and advanced simulation engineering.

1. PROJECT DESCRIPTION

To enable faster product development cycles, the client aims to replace some of the physical product tests by virtual product tests. To do this in an efficient manner, the goal is to integrate mechanical testing / simulation capabilities directly into the creation tools, such that the (virtual) mechanical testing can be executed by the product creation team under only weak supervision by the testing and simulation teams.

The goal of this assignment is the integration of Abaqus capabilities into Rhino/Grasshopper. The focus of the contractor will be the addition of additional capabilities for stream-lined simulation setup into the existing pipeline to meet new demands from business partners. The service will be provided in an agile environment (Kanban). For more detailed tasks, see the next section.

During this project the contractor will be confronted with challenging simulation problems given by the product creation and innovation teams. These problems need to be solved by using the above-mentioned tools. The aim will be to extend the capabilities of the toolset.

2. BACKGROUND TO THE ASSIGNMENT

The purpose is to enhance current creation pipelines using cloud-based Finite Element Analysis. As similar expertise and experience is not available within the internal development team, the contractor will serve as the principal expert for those topics. Meetings take place on a (daily to bi-weekly) basis (based on the project phase and progress).

3. SERVICE DESCRIPTION

The service will be provided within the framework of an agile development method and the assignments of tasks to the contractor will be managed using a Kanban board. The contractor will be granted access to the Kanban board, and the contractor will be able to pick tasks (move the tasks into the contractor’s respective “In Progress” lane) from the board independently based on the assigned priority. Due to the agile nature of Kanban, not all work packages can already be defined in advance and more work packages could be defined over the course of the project, but which are generally provided independently by the contractor.

The contractor takes over the role as Developer and the team iteratively discusses the currently existing backlog, which gives a good indication of tasks that should be completed (more detailed requirements will be present in Jira Board). The client will provide all necessary products, information, guidelines, contact details, documents, access to relevant systems and all other requirements in advance. The work-packages will be specified and shared using a Jira-Board. Handover of each virtual product in relation to the defined scope below (shared via appropriate means: Bitbucket for code and examples and SharePoint for documentation) to the client for approval.

The scope of services includes the following tasks, which are independently performed by the contractor:

• Implementation of a FEA-simulation based testing software component for pre-defined standard test-cases (FE4). The Python implementation will be hosted in the client’s GIT repositories and deployed to Artifactory. The physical test-cases are developed and provided upfront either by the client’s Innovation or Advanced Testing Team.
• Implementation of an interface component to call FEA-simulation from Rhino/Grasshopper as a Python plugin in Grasshopper based on the contractor’s experience. The component collects the data required for Cloud-FEA and calls the endpoints accordingly.
• Implementation of Jenkins scripts for CI/CD (continuous integration / development) pipelines for the implemented components including test-cases for the FE4 software component.
• Implementation of read-back and visualization of deformed geometries from Cloud-FEA into Rhino.