README for HbFree 

AUTHOR

G. Serdyuk
Scherbakova St., 36A, 
Kiev, Ukraine
ph./fax :380 44 443-4984
E-mail: <gserdyuk@mail.ru> 
http://users.sovamua.com/foratech/gserdyuk/hbfree
http://gserdyuk.nm.ru/hbfree
		
DATE

6-Sep-2000

VERSION

0.1

FOREWORD
	
This analog circuits simulator was started in early 80's  and after that
it have passed along intricate way. It was reviewed a lot during last 
year, translator from SPICE have been designed to improve compatibility 
and make usage simpler. But not all things work good still. It is first 
public release of this program (or even package). 
It have been made for Linux; Win* release will be made soon.

I hope it will useful for somebody and ask, if you will use it, 
-  please, let me know if you will find bugs, have suggestions or
propositions.  I am ready to answer to possible questions regarding this
program (but it is not formal support).

I consider the possibility to distribute this program (or improved
version) as a shareware, so I am very interested in public usage to 
* estimate market 
* find and fix the bugs

It is not complete design system, nor even multifunction simulator like 
SPICE - it just harmonic balance nonlinear circuit simulation program, 
but I hope it will grow and gain new functionality.

PURPOSE

HbFree is a harmonic balance circuit simulator. It can simulate analog 
non-autonomous nonlinear circuits under 1- or 2- tone excitation using 
harmonic balance technique. It should be useful for simulation of 
mixers,modulators, power amplifiers in radio-frequencies and microwaves 
(RF&MW). It's core was designed at middle 80's and after that was 
modified and ported many times.

PLATFORMS

I have made it for RedHat Linux release 6.0, kernel v. 2.2.5-22.
Please, let me know if it will work on other versions.

Version for Win* (console, not windowed) will coming soon.

DOWNLOAD

Primary site is:
http://users.sovamua.com/foratech/gserdyuk/hbfree
This package should be in file hbfree-0.1.tgz
See also documentation and examples.

INSTALLATION

Linux

Run 
"$ gunzip -c hbfree-0.1.tgz|tar x"
from your home directory. "hbfree-0.1" directory will be created. 
Enter there, make yourself as superuser and execute
"# install-hbf"
Distribution files will be copied to /usr/local/hbfree-0.1 and
subdirectories.

Win*
Create directory.
Unzip archive into directory. Use hbw.exe wrapper to start programs.
It is useful to include program directory into "path" variable.

FILES

readme					- this file
hbfree-0.1.tar.gz		- intel linux binaries
exampls.tar.gz			- examples and their results for linux distr.
hbw-0.1.zip				- win (dos mode) binaries (examples included)
hbfree.doc-0.1.tar.gz	- ps documatation (pre-release)
hbfree.doc-0.1.pdf		- pdf documatation (pre-release)


BUGS AND SUGGESTIONS

You, probably, will have crashes of the program on certain tasks.
Please, report about bugs to <gserdyuk@mail.ru>.
I would be grateful for your opinion about this program and suggestions.

RESTRICTIONS

Main restriction are:
* Number of harmonics should not be larger than 20. 
* Overall task size should not be larger than 180 complex variables. 	
Task size TS=NN*HN,
where:
NN - total number of nonlinear nodes. Note, that each diode yields
2 nonlinear nodes, each MESFET - 3;
HN - number of harmonics.
Thus, circuit can not contain more than 4 diodes or 3 MESFETs. 

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

* Boris Shelkovnikov <helios@ukrnet.net> have performed supervision of 
this project during 80's and early 90's. Many thanks for advises and 
support.
* Leonid Lomaka <helios@ukrnet.net> was the first user of this HB 
simulator. Many bugs have been found due to his efforts.
* Alexander Belogolovskiy <asb@istu.kiev.ua> have designed "s2h"
translator despite of many inconsistencies in my specifications.
