Vladimir Slivker – författare

To our sons, Mike, Andrew, Alex, who did not inherit their fathers' level of interest in applied mechanics, but who became sophisticated in software development and in this regard surpassed their parents. A.P., V.S. Hard times came, the god5 got angry. Children do not behave themselves and everybody wishes to write a book. Ancient Babylonian inscription X Preface Preface to the English Edition The book you are reading is a translation from Russian into English. Within a pretty short term this book saw two editions in Russian. The authors received in­ spiring responses from readers that both stimulated our continuing and improving this work and made sure it would not be in vain of us to try to multiply our readers by covering the English-speaking engineering community. When we prepared the present edition, we took into account interests of the Western readers, so we had to make some changes to our text published earlier. These changes include the following aspects. First, we excluded a lot of references and discussions regarding Russian engi­ neering codes. It seems to us those are of no real interest for Western engineers oriented at Eurocode or national construction design regulations.

To our sons, Mike, Andrew, Alex, who did not inherit their fathers'' level of interest in applied mechanics, but who became sophisticated in software development and in this regard surpassed their parents. A.P., V.S. Hard times came, the god5 got angry. Children do not behave themselves and everybody wishes to write a book. Ancient Babylonian inscription X Preface Preface to the English Edition The book you are reading is a translation from Russian into English. Within a pretty short term this book saw two editions in Russian. The authors received in­ spiring responses from readers that both stimulated our continuing and improving this work and made sure it would not be in vain of us to try to multiply our readers by covering the English-speaking engineering community. When we prepared the present edition, we took into account interests of the Western readers, so we had to make some changes to our text published earlier. These changes include the following aspects. First, we excluded a lot of references and discussions regarding Russian engi­ neering codes. It seems to us those are of no real interest for Western engineers oriented at Eurocode or national construction design regulations.

The presentment should be as simple as possible, but not a bit simpler. Albert Einstein Introduction The power of the variational approach in mechanics of solids and structures follows from its versatility: the approach is used both as a universal tool for describing physical relationships and as a basis for qualitative methods of analysis [1]. And there is yet another important advantage inherent in the variational approach – the latter is a crystal clear, pure and unsophisticated source of ideas that help build and establish numerical techniques for mechanics. This circumstance was realized thoroughly and became especially important after the advanced numerical techniques of structural mechanics, first of all the finite element method, had become a helpful tool of the modern engineer. Certainly, it took some time after pioneering works by Turner, Clough and Melos until the finite element method was understood as a numerical technique for solving mathematical physics problems; nowadays no one would attempt to question an eminent role played by the variational approach in the process of this understanding. It is a combination of intuitive engineer thinking and a thoroughly developed mathematical theory of variational calculus which gave the finite element method an impulse so strong that its influence can still be felt. It would be too rash to say that there are few publications or books on the subject matter discussed in this book.

The presentment should be as simple as possible, but not a bit simpler. Albert Einstein Introduction The power of the variational approach in mechanics of solids and structures follows from its versatility: the approach is used both as a universal tool for describing physical relationships and as a basis for qualitative methods of analysis [1]. And there is yet another important advantage inherent in the variational approach – the latter is a crystal clear, pure and unsophisticated source of ideas that help build and establish numerical techniques for mechanics. This circumstance was realized thoroughly and became especially important after the advanced numerical techniques of structural mechanics, first of all the finite element method, had become a helpful tool of the modern engineer. Certainly, it took some time after pioneering works by Turner, Clough and Melos until the finite element method was understood as a numerical technique for solving mathematical physics problems; nowadays no one would attempt to question an eminent role played by the variational approach in the process of this understanding. It is a combination of intuitive engineer thinking and a thoroughly developed mathematical theory of variational calculus which gave the finite element method an impulse so strong that its influence can still be felt. It would be too rash to say that there are few publications or books on the subject matter discussed in this book.

To our sons, Mike, Andrew, Alex, who did not inherit their fathers' level of interest in applied mechanics, but who became sophisticated in software development and in this regard surpassed their parents. A.P., V.S. Hard times came, the god5 got angry. Children do not behave themselves and everybody wishes to write a book. Ancient Babylonian inscription X Preface Preface to the English Edition The book you are reading is a translation from Russian into English. Within a pretty short term this book saw two editions in Russian. The authors received in­ spiring responses from readers that both stimulated our continuing and improving this work and made sure it would not be in vain of us to try to multiply our readers by covering the English-speaking engineering community. When we prepared the present edition, we took into account interests of the Western readers, so we had to make some changes to our text published earlier. These changes include the following aspects. First, we excluded a lot of references and discussions regarding Russian engi­ neering codes. It seems to us those are of no real interest for Western engineers oriented at Eurocode or national construction design regulations.

The presentment should be as simple as possible, but not a bit simpler. Albert Einstein Introduction The power of the variational approach in mechanics of solids and structures follows from its versatility: the approach is used both as a universal tool for describing physical relationships and as a basis for qualitative methods of analysis [1]. And there is yet another important advantage inherent in the variational approach – the latter is a crystal clear, pure and unsophisticated source of ideas that help build and establish numerical techniques for mechanics. This circumstance was realized thoroughly and became especially important after the advanced numerical techniques of structural mechanics, first of all the finite element method, had become a helpful tool of the modern engineer. Certainly, it took some time after pioneering works by Turner, Clough and Melos until the finite element method was understood as a numerical technique for solving mathematical physics problems; nowadays no one would attempt to question an eminent role played by the variational approach in the process of this understanding. It is a combination of intuitive engineer thinking and a thoroughly developed mathematical theory of variational calculus which gave the finite element method an impulse so strong that its influence can still be felt. It would be too rash to say that there are few publications or books on the subject matter discussed in this book.