# How to open the odb file of abaqus using paraview
**URL:** https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543
**Category:** ParaView Support
**Tags:** python, vtk
**Created:** [July 19, 2023, 7:02am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543 "2023-07-19T07:02:43Z")
**Posts on this page:** 7
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@LOX](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/LOX)
#### Post date: [July 19, 2023, 7:02am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/1 "2023-07-19T07:02:43Z")
1、I downloaded that part of the code[odb2vtk](https://github.com/Liujie-SYSU/odb2vtk)
2、Follow the documentation steps to set up
3、Send an error when I perform the following steps in the command window
> > > ConvertOdb2Vtk(‘F:\Temp\odb2vtk.txt’)
> > > Traceback (most recent call last):
> > > File “”, line 1, in
> > > File “F:\SIMULIA\EstProducts\2021\win\_b64\code\python2.7\lib\odb2vtk.py”, line 34, in ConvertOdb2Vtk
> > > odb\_path = input[1]
> > > IndexError: list index out of range
> > >
> > > 
4、Using another function also reports an error
> > > ConvertOdb2VtkP(‘F:\Temp’,‘CP10\_L6\_DP1’,‘F:\Temp\CP10\_L6\_DP1’,‘12’,‘2’,‘0’,‘20’,‘0’,‘0’)
> > > Basic Information:
> > > Model: CP10\_L6\_DP1 ; Mesh type: Hexahedron ; Number of blocks: 2
> > > Convert frames: 0 to 20
> > > Step & Instance : [‘0’] , [‘0’]
> > > Traceback (most recent call last):
> > > File “”, line 1, in
> > > File “F:\SIMULIA\EstProducts\2021\win\_b64\code\python2.7\lib\odb2vtk.py”, line 661, in ConvertOdb2VtkP
> > > odb = openOdb(os.path.join(odb\_path,odbname)+‘.odb’,readOnly=True)
> > > OdbError: The database is from a previous release of Abaqus.
> > > Run abaqus -upgrade -job -odb to upgrade it.
> > >
> > > 
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### Author:  [@nicolas.vuaille](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/nicolas.vuaille)
#### Post date: [July 20, 2023, 2:37pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/2 "2023-07-20T14:37:45Z")
I fear this is a bug in the script you use, and not related to ParaView itself.
So you should better open an issue on the github repository you link.
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### Author:  [@zhanghf4000](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/zhanghf4000)
#### Post date: [July 11, 2024, 1:52am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/3 "2024-07-11T01:52:25Z")
Hello, The same question came up in my process.
Have you solved it?
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### Author:  [@Cam](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Cam)
#### Post date: [October 8, 2024, 7:19pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/4 "2024-10-08T19:19:09Z")
check out this [repo](https://github.com/Arris-Composites/ODB2VTK)
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### Author:  [@todoooo](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/todoooo)
#### Post date: [October 9, 2024, 1:51am UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/5 "2024-10-09T01:51:00Z")
Did you consider writing VTKHDF output?
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### Author:  [@Cam](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/Cam)
#### Post date: [October 15, 2024, 7:48pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/6 "2024-10-15T19:48:59Z")
Yes. I did consider HDF when I first started the project. I did some research and trial and error but ended up not doing it because there was too much hassle dealing with Python 2. But eventually, I think HDF format is the way to go because it is more efficient than the conventional VTK data format. Not only does HDF has more condensed data storage but speeds up conversion runtime because there are fewer I/O operations involved. Now that Abaqus 2024 finally uses Python 3, I was hoping there are some out-of-the-box libraries I can directly use.
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### Author:  [@todoooo](https://discourse.paraview.org/u/todoooo)
#### Post date: [October 15, 2024, 9:50pm UTC](https://discourse.paraview.org/t/how-to-open-the-odb-file-of-abaqus-using-paraview/12543/7 "2024-10-15T21:50:25Z")
What you have already done is an excellent contribution.
I was actually thinking along on the lines of C++ for HDF generation, since it is the most efficient solution, but I have never looked into implementing such code.