While the standard provision specifications address the ability of the steel members to adequately resist all the forces applied to the structure, the special seismic provisions ensure that the building is appropriately designed, proportioned and detailed to resist seismic loading in a ductile and life-safe manner. Therefore, the purpose of the Special Seismic Provision Post-Processors is to investigate each steel frame member and restrained (fixed) beam-column joint for the design and detailing requirements of the selected steel design specification.

The special seismic provisions are not meant to supplant the standard provision checks, in fact, the special seismic provisions depend on forces and combinations generated to perform standard provision checks. To this end the special seismic and the standard provision checks are tightly linked. Changes in forces, combinations, member sizes, criteria when in standard provision mode will change the available options and the results when in seismic provision mode.

The seismic specifications currently implemented are the American Institute of Steel Construction Inc, (ANSI341-05) 2005 – Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings ASD and LRFD (Including Supplement No 1, November 2005), Steel Construction Inc, (ANSI341-02) 2002 – Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings LRFD, (AISC) 1997 – Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings LRFD (Supplement No.2), the Uniform Building Code (UBC) 1997 – Section 2210, Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings LRFD, and UBC 1997 – Section 2212, Seismic Provisions for Structural Steel Buildings ASD.

Using Code-generated and/or user-defined load combinations the detailing and strength requirements are checked for each member and valid joints, and the results displayed graphically. In addition to the screen display, several output reports are also available.