Abstract: The construction tension control is a key technique for reticulated shell-string structure． The whole construction process of structure was traced by inverse analysis method based on the theory of controlling the original length of cable． First，the initial status and the initial cable length were calculated by means of controlling the cable force and the internal force of all members in the pre-stressed state were obtained at the same time． Then，the tension force at each grade and batch was obtained，via controlling the initial cable length of every grade and calculating by the iterative algorithm of nonlinear finite element． A piece of software calculating cable tension was built by using VC ++ 6．0 program，which avoids the repeated calculation in the large current FEM program． Finally，an experiment on the reticulated shell-string model was done，with which the construction was simulated by the multi-times and batching tensioning method，which traced the stress state of bar member during construction process． It was shown that the calculation results by the proposed method were matched the experimental results and the method could accurately simulate the shape-forming process of structure． cables were tensioned only once and the construction was simplified．