Recent work on fundamentals of elastic--plastic finite-element analysis and its applications to the mechanics of crack opening and growth in ductile solids are reviewed. A precise formulation of incremental equilibrium equations and their finite-element forms in a manner valid for deformations of arbitrary magnitude is described. Special features of computational procedures are outlined for accuracy in view of the near-incompressibility of elastic--plastic response. Applications to crack mechanics include the analysis of large plastic defomations at a progressively opening crack tip, the determination of J integral values and of limitations to J characterizations of the intensity of the crack tip field, and the determination of crack tip fields in stable crack growth
