feature request: more descriptive error message instead of "FATAL ERROR: face ... in patch ... does not have neighbour cell face ..."
I was trying to follow this tutorial implementing an axisymmetric cylinder and piston when I got the infamous error (FYI my blockMeshDict).
Googling the error message above returns tens, if not hundreds, of different forum posts. Although some of them can be grouped in similar categories:
- wrong order of verticies
- wrong face/patch/block definition
- patch isn't defined in the boundary file
- ...
in the end they are different and there is no way to systematically debug the problem. Usually it is suggested to use some form of visualization tool like paraFoam -block
to check the defined geometry. however paraFoam requires Linux and for people like me who are running OpenFOAM on a headless cluster it is not available. besides it needs the generated mesh from blockMesh
to work! Other visualization tools also have similar issues as far as a I know. Either they are not available for macOS/Windows.
It would be a great help if the error message could be more descriptive. What could be done:
- searching the internet for all the cases who ended up with this error message
- categorizing them in specific groups with similar solutions
- finding a way to diagnose those mistakes programmatically
- offering a more descriptive error message which can be used to resolve the issue.
## Reattaching the author to the issue ticket: @foadsf ##