Skills
A skill is a procedure Dlubal CALC follows the same way every time. Where a plain question gets you an answer shaped by how you asked it, a skill gets you the same steps, the same checks and the same output on Monday as on Friday.
Using one
Type / in the message box and pick from the list, or type the command directly:
/steel-design IPE 300, span 6 m, S235, UDL 12 kN/m
The list is searchable, so / followed by a word narrows it. A skill without arguments
asks you for what it needs rather than guessing.
When a skill is worth it
A skill pays off when the procedure repeats and the wording should not vary: an office standard for a member check, a fixed report structure, a check sequence a reviewer expects in a particular order.
If two colleagues would answer the same question with two different sets of steps, that is the case a skill fixes. If a single sentence in a chat already gets it right, you do not need one.
Your own skills
Writing your own comes with Professional and above, and creating one costs 3 credits. You describe the procedure in the library, and it becomes available with a slash command like any other.
Example: your office always checks lateral torsional buckling with the same simplified method before the full one, and the report has to show both. Written once as a skill, every colleague gets that order without being told.
Where to go next
- Your first calculation for the plain-question path.
- Reports for turning the output into a document.
- Plans and credits for what a skill costs to create.