Installation procedure of MPC Optimisation program, and initial information for users.


MPC Optimisation software has been developed by Dr Mikhail Vasiliev (at the Electron Science Research Institute, Edith Cowan University, Perth, Australia) between 2005-2019.

The development of multiple features of this program  took place during the various stages of ongoing research work aimed at developing novel optical materials. Invaluable contributions to the development of various features have been received from Prof Kamal Alameh and Dr Mohammad Nur-E-Alam, who also co-authored the article submitted to Elsevier Computer Physics Communications in April 2019, entitled "Analysis, optimization, and characterization of magnetic photonic crystal structures and thin-film material layers."
 

The program is distributed under the terms of Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-3.0 Unported Licence (CC BY-NC-3.0).

The source code of Visual Studio 2003 Solution is not intended for wide open-source distribution, unless the users agree to obtain the relevant component software licenses: 

1. GigaSoft ProEssentials v5 .NET graphing active-X controls library, with either the evaluation, or developer rights licence applied through intalling ProEssentials v. 5 software onto developer's computer system, with a purchased Product Key.
2. Bluebit .NET Matrix Library v. 2.2, targeting the .NET framework v. 1.1 (older version, which may or may not be available currently). 

The code will not compile and build, unless Microsoft Visual Studio 2003 Professional is used, and the component software licenses have been obtained (min. evaluation copies of both BlueBit Matrix Library and Gigasoft ProEssentials v5 are required).
Later versions of Visual Studio (eg VS 2017) might be able to open the Solution, and even compile code, but not run the program. This is because these newer versions of VS cannot target .NET Framework 1.1





INSTALLATION INSTRUCTIONS

The program can be installed onto practically any Windows machine, starting from at least Windows 2000.

1. Install Microsoft .NET Framework version 1.1, using the supplied file dotnetfx (PREREQUISITE). This pre-requisite installation is not known to cause any side-effects on any Windows systemms.

2. Right-click Setup.exe file and Run as Administrator; alternatively, right-click the installer file MPC Optimisation setup, select 'Install".

3. Follow the prompts; the default installation directory is C:\Program Files (x86)\MPC Optimisation

After the program has been installed, the program icon can be found by looking at Start | All Programs | MPC Optimisation. Alternatively, the executable file Optimised_MPC will be found in the installation directory. it is recommended to right-click on this file and select "Pin to Taskbar".

After the program is first run, press either the 'Compute formula" or "OPTIMISE" button, to see the effects of thin-film modelling or optimisation in process.


The Help menu contains a compiled .html help file with detailed introduction into the features of this program and its operation.

Additionally, the article in Elsevier Computer Physics communications contains a comprehensive overview of program features and examples of operation. 


UNINSTALLATION: use the uninstallation function in the Control Panel.




