Rocscience has a new partner on the team! We are happy to welcome Ashraf Ismail as Rocscience Representative in Indonesia and Malaysia. We chatted down with Ashraf to get to know him better.

Rocscience: Tell us a bit about yourself, Ashraf. What do you do, and how did you get into your field?

Dr. Ashraf Ismail: I’m an Associate Professor at School of Civil Engineering, Universiti Sains Malaysia. I obtained my B.Eng. (Civil) from USM in 2004 and my M.Eng. in Geological Engineering at Gadjah Mada University in 2006. In 2010, I obtained my Ph.D. in Geotechnical Engineering specializing in Rock Engineering, Underground Construction and Underground Energy Storage for Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG) from Kyoto University, Japan. I have conducted research specializing in various aspects of geotechnical and rock engineering such as: the evaluation of rock overstressing in hard rock tunnel; urban tunneling; slope stability analysis; and geohazard and geophysical applications in civil engineering.

R What is your history with Rocscience products? What tools do you use, and for how long?

AI My history with Rocscience product started when I was using a free version of RocLab while

studying for my Master’s degree at Gadjah Mada University in Indonesia. I was impressed with the easy-to-use and

extensive database of RocLab at that time. I had the chance to explore more Rocscience tools when I started working at USM, where we used geotechnical software for teaching purposes in design classes. In 2011 I met Dr. John Curran in Malaysia when Rocscience was exhibiting their products at a conference I attended, where I began to explore using Rocscience tools for teaching. After discussion with my former Dean during that time, we purchased the Rocscience Education Program, which we continue to use today for several of our undergraduate geotechnical engineering courses and postgraduate research. For the past five years we have used Slide and RS2 for slope stability analysis, underground excavation works such as rock cavern, tunnels, and deep open excavation analysis. In addition, several of my students are enthusiastic users of Dips, RocFall, and Swedge.

R What do you like most about your Rocscience products?

AI My favourite aspects of my Rocscience tools are the user-friendly visual user interface and the

built-up rock database from experience all over the world. I appreciate the updated tutorial sets and verification manuals, which are good for us as researchers and educators. In addition, continuous updates of the software keep it at par or above the other competitors in this field. I also consider the rock package to be comprehensive, wherein most of the analysis required for rock engineering can be carried out using Rocscience tools.

Welcoming Ashraf Ismail

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R Tell us about your first Rocscience course. What were it like, and what did you learn?

AI The first Rocscience course I attended was in Brisbane in early 2017. This course opened my

eyes to new features of Rocscience’s 3D software like RS3 and Slide3. We learned a lot during these three days from the guru himself: Dr. Thamer Yacoub. I really encourage other Rocscience users to participate in Rocscience Workshops because the experience is unique, and the learning outcomes help make you a better engineer or educator.

R How did you start building a relationship with Thamer and Rocscience?

AI I started building a relationship with Dr. Yacoub when I was participating in the Rocscience

Workshop in Brisbane. Alison McQuillan, the Rocscience Representative for Australasia, was also instrumental in helping me establish and maintain contact with Dr. Yacoub even after the workshop had finished.

R How will you be working to advance Rocscience in Malaysia going forward?

AI I’m planning to advance Rocscience in Malaysia first through educating future engineers at the

university level the importance of using modern tools in engineering analysis without compromising the understanding of the basic and fundamental concept of the engineering designs and analysis. So far, several

universities in Malaysia have been using Rocscience tools for their geotechnical engineering courses, but I would like to see the software usage extend to other technical universities and polytechnics. The efforts look fruitful as we can see many young engineers today becoming more familiar with Rocscience tools.

Starting in 2018, I will start holding Rocscience User Meetings in Malaysia to provide a platform for current and future Rocscience to share knowledge and learn from each other. These meetings will provide a platform for Rocscience to share new updates and releases, explore state of the art case studies, and hear about the excellent applications of Rocscience tools here in Malaysia.

Through these two programs, in addition to a stronger Rocscience presence at several major geotechnical engineering conferences, I’m confident that Rocscience will become more well-known among engineers in Malaysia.

R Why Rocscience? What about the company, tools, or people made you want to work with us?

AI I’m excited to work with Rocscience because I use the tools every day and I am confident in their ability

to analyze complex geotechnical engineering problems. The tools themselves have helped me and my students in much of our research. Finally, the people at Rocscience are very friendly and helpful; particularly Alison, who helped me in coordinating the first Rocscience workshop in Kuala Lumpur in October 2017.

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Kek Lok Si Temple in Penang, Malaysia.