where, in general, the field variable or the unknown function φ is a vector.

The finite
element procedure for solving this problem can be stated by the following steps:

Step 1: The solution domain V is divided into E smaller parts called subdomains that
we call finite elements.

Step 2: The field variable φ,  which we are trying to find, is assumed to vary in each
element in a suitable manner as

 = [N ]Φ
φ  (e) (5.55)

where [N ] is a matrix of shape functions ([N ] will be a function of the coordinates), and
 associated with the element.
 (e) is a vector representing the nodal values of the function φ
Φ

Step 3: To derive the elemental equations, we use the conditions of extremization of

the functional I with respect to the nodal unknowns Φ associated with the whole domain.
∼
These are
⎧ ⎫
⎪
⎪ ∂I/∂Φ 1 ⎪
⎪
⎪
⎪ ⎪
⎨ ∂I/∂Φ2 ⎪ ⎬
∂I
= .. =0 (5.56)

∂Φ ⎪
⎪ . ⎪
⎪
∼ ⎪
⎪ ⎪
⎪
⎩ ⎭
∂I/∂ΦM

where M denotes the total number of nodal unknowns in the problem. If the functional I
can be expressed as a summation of elemental contributions as


E
I= I (e) (5.57)
e=1

where e indicates the element number, then Eq. (5.56) can be expressed as

∂I  ∂I (e)
E
= = 0, i = 1, 2, . . . , M (5.58)
∂Φi e=1
∂Φi

 and its derivatives, we can

In the special case in which I is a quadratic functional of φ
obtain the element equations as

∂I (e)  (e) − P
 (e)
= [K (e) ]Φ (5.59)
 (e)
∂Φ

 (e) are the element characteristic matrix and characteristic vector (or
where [K (e) ] and P
vector of nodal actions), respectively.

Step 4: To obtain the overall equations of the system, we rewrite Eq. (5.56) as

∂I  = 0
 −P
= [K ]Φ (5.60)

∂Φ ∼ ∼ ∼
∼