Keywords: slope stability, limit equilibrium, object-oriented, free and open source software, java, jogl.

The stability of soil slopes is of great concern for civil engineers. Civil engineers use slope stability analysis to ensure that earth dams, embankments, deep excavations and retaining walls are stable. Limit equilibrium methods of slices are the most commonly used methods for slope stability analysis. One of the problems with the limit equilibrium method is the evaluation of the critical failure surface. Most available commercial software considers circular failure surfaces with different radius and centers (known as the grid search technique). Although this type of slip surface is approximately acceptable for homogenous soils, it is not suitable for layered or weak soils.

Currently, several heuristic optimization algorithms have been developed to determine the critical failure surface. The Monte Carlo technique [1], the genetic algorithm [2], the leap-frog optimization [3], the particle swarm optimization [4] and fish swarm optimization [5] are some of them. The first step in many of these papers is to implement the limit equilibrium codes which can lead to more time and more cost for the paper and work. OpenSlope is an open source framework that has been developed to eliminate this additional time. The object-oriented organization of OpenSlope allows the researcher to easily add their optimization methods and check the result. The other use of OpenSlope is for the probabilistic analysis of slope stability. In addition to the mentioned usages, OpenSlope has a user friendly graphical environment and in summary it can be a free alternative to the commercially available software.

1

A.I.H. Malkawi, W.F. Hassan, S.K. Sarma, "An efficient search method for locating circular slip surface using Monte Carlo technique", Canadian Geotechnical Journal, 38, 1081-9, 2001. doi:10.1139/cgj-38-5-1081

2

A. Sengupta, A. Upadhyay, "Locating the critical failure surface in a slope stability analysis by genetic algorithm", Applied Soft Computing, 9, 387-392, 2009. doi:10.1016/j.asoc.2008.04.015

3

H.P.J. Bolton, G. Heymann, A. Groenwold, "Global search for critical failure surface in slope stability analysis", Engineering Optimization, 35, 51-65, 2003. doi:10.1080/0305215031000064749

4

Y.M. Cheng, L. Li, Sh. Chi, W.B. Wei, "Particle swarm optimization algorithm for the location of the critical non-circular failure surface in two-dimensional slope stability analysis", Computers and Geotechnics, 34, 92-103, 2007. doi:10.1016/j.compgeo.2006.10.012

5

Y.M. Cheng, L. Liang, S.C. Chi, W.B. Wei, "Determination of the critical slip surface using artificial fish swarm algorithm", Journal of Geotechnical and Geoenvironmental Engineering, ASCE, 134(2), 244-251, 2008. doi:10.1061/(ASCE)1090-0241(2008)134:2(244)

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