Productivity tools to study constrained motion: electrician's approach to mechanician's problem

Abstract

An application design is offered, which students of physics can use when authoring a solver for mechanical systems with constraints. A 'chainlist' concept is introduced to capture a constrained mechanical system configuration and to pass the simulation scenario to the solver application. Code samples are given to start off the solver application (simulator) project. A short review of linear algebra for constrained motion computations (pseudoinverse) is given.