A survey of commercially available electromagnetic modeling software

The author surveys a number of numerical EM (electromagnetic) modeling software packages, giving attention to the features of each package and the modeling software in general. The survey shows that today´s commercially available EM modeling software packages vary quite significantly from package to package. One must be careful to select a software package. One must be careful to select a software package on the basis of its application, and how the specific package may address that application. For ease of use, the user should consider the software´s import and export capabilities as well as the general user interface. Postprocessing flexibility is an import feature of the software package and should be evaluated based on what the user needs. The cost of a program must be evaluated not only in terms of the cost of the package but also in terms of cost of the computer platform it is run on, the monthly maintenance fees, software upgrades, and training