Development of laser ablation integrated simulation program for windows with visual fortran and OpenGL

Abstract

An integrated simulation program for virtual laser ablation is developed to help understand and predict the effects of machining parameters on the final machined results. The main solver of the program is based on the model for polymer ablation with short-pulse Excimer lasers. The GUI of the program is built using Visual Fortran and OpenGL so that the user can work in a visual environment, such as Windows on a PC, where the important machining parameters can be input via a dialog box and the calculated results for the machined shape can be plotted by means of a 3D graphics window using OpenGL. The developed GUI can be implemented for use with most pre-developed FORTRAN solvers for Windows application, allowing the user to control the input parameters and to see the results in a 3D plot; hence most FORTRAN users could create their own visual programs on PC Windows systems similarly, widening the range of application of FORTRAN solvers.