Unit Systems
Unit Systems in Granta MI allow numeric values to be converted to units other than the underlying database unit when the data is displayed, edited, or exported.
Granta MI databases include a number of common unit systems like Metric, US Customary, UK Imperial, and SI (Consistent).
Some units are common across all Unit Systems, for example, the volt (V); all Attributes measured by voltage are stored in this unit, and there is no need to convert the data values for display or export in any Unit System. In general, however, for each unit in the database, it is necessary to specify its equivalent unit in each Unit System in the database so that values are converted to the appropriate units in that system.
Examples of Unit System equivalents defined in the MI Training database:
| Measure | Database unit name | Unit | Metric equivalent | SI equivalent | CGS (Consistent) equivalent | US Customary equivalent |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Length | metre | m | 1 m | 1 m | 100 cm | 3.2808 ft |
| Weight | newton | N | 1 N | 1 N | 100000 dyn | 0.2248 lbf |
| Temperature | Temperature (Kelvin/Celsius) | K | 1 K | 1 K | 1 K | 1.8 °R |
| Pressure | megapascal | MPa | 1 MPa | 1e6 Pa | 1e7 dyn/cm^2 | 0.14504 ksi |
| Voltage | volt | V | 1 V | 1 V | 1 V | 1 V |
In MI Viewer and MI Explore, users can choose the Unit System to use for viewing and editing data. This determines the units used throughout the application to display and enter numerical values. Any data entered is converted to the underlying database unit when it is saved in the database.
Example from MI Viewer showing effect of changing the Unit System on viewing and searching numerical data:
When generating Excel export templates in MI Toolbox, it is possible to specify a Unit System which will be used to convert underlying numeric values from Database units to the required equivalent values/units in the export file.
All Granta MI databases contain a range of standard Unit Systems. You should normally never need to create a new Unit System and Ansys strongly recommends that wherever possible, you should use the standard Granta Unit Systems. If you do need to define a new one, you should do so by copying and pasting an existing Unit System that is as similar as possible to the one you want to create, and then editing it as required. For each unit in the database whose equivalent unit differs between the original and new Unit Systems, you must then update the equivalent unit in the new system.
Display Names may be defined for Unit System names. Where a Display Name is defined, MI application users will see this in the UI instead of the Unit System name defined in the schema. See Display Names.