WWJ ScreenSaver mode for BOINC-project

[hornig]

Hi,

I'm from www.aerospaceresearch.net/constellation and we operate a distributed computing platform using BOINC.

BOINC was made to run during screensaver mode but it's even more. But for the screensaver mode we need one of our own.
That's why I contacted whatnick, because I really like WorldWind, used kml files for it before (search this forum ;)) and I like the community. I asked where to asked for help and whatnick was/is so niceto help us modify WWJ to serve our needs and in return there will be a nice little logo on the screensaver and on our website doing advertizemen for WW :).

I start this thread for everyone who want to know more, have some tips or want to help.

our current planned features are:
* self excutable WWJ to run on several OS
* basic animation with rotating globe
* showing some status infos from our boinc project including progress, workunitname, runtime, systemtime, etc

future features are:
* different modes withing WW to show flightpath from our TrackJack app, or moon globe for the OnTheMoon app.
* more OS

I hope you like the idea

Andreas

[what_nick]

Hi Guys,

I have lifted some code of the forums and made a simplistic full-screen mode worldwind which does a timed fly-to for different locations. I compiled into a native .exe to ease distribution without the Java runtime using Excelsior JET. This will only work for Windows and Linux, not native compiler exists for Mac in JET. Are there options for native compilation of byte-code on Mac ?

The windows sample is here http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15821898/wwscreen_saver-native.zip

The corresponding, very simplistic source file can be found here:

http://code.google.com/p/jaxb-collada/source/browse/src/org/csiro/examples/model/FullScreenTest.java

I am planning to move it off to another google code project soon.

Cheers,

whatnick.

[hornig]

hi,

I downloaded the new dropbox file and when started it displays
"Fatal error: Excelsior jet 7.20 installation cannot been found...".

Is there something missing?

The last file worked fine, but I wanted to test the new rotation mode thatyou added.

Andreas

[nlneilson]

Trying the screen saver gets the same error as mentioned by Andreas.
It also has"
If you port compiled executables to other machines, please, use the JetPackII
deployment wizard (see JET User's Guide, "Deployment Automation" for details).

I tried Jet a while back. My WWJ .jar was about 5MB and was only able to get the .exe
down to about 30MB. A programmer at Jet was able to get it down to about 12MB
including a minimal jre. That .exe could be transfered ot other machines.

It would have cost about $1000 for the Win version and another $1000 for the Linux
version. That was for Java 1.6. I am using 1.7 now so it would have required extra
$$ upgrading a Jet 1.6 to 1.7. Jet is a good program but could not justify the cost.

I am just getting into OpenSceneGraph/osgEarth to port a WWJ app into Native C++.
I also looked at ossimPlanet.

Neil

[what_nick]

Hi Andreas,

Can you grab the whole jaxb-collada project and try to run the Java version. I probably missed something on the packaging side. Grab the JET demo from Excelsior and see if you can replicate my work.

Neil, ossimPlanet is fairly mature in what it does, and multi-platform (C++ can be one of the most portable things if properly done). I would really love to see some language agnosticism.

Cheers,

whatnick.

[dleskov]

It would have cost about $1000 for the Win version and another $1000 for the Linux
version. That was for Java 1.6. I am using 1.7 now so it would have required extra
$$ upgrading a Jet 1.6 to 1.7. Jet is a good program but could not justify the cost.

FYI, free Excelsior JET licenses are available for non-commercial use (http://www.excelsior-usa.com/jetfree.html).

Hopefully you can justify zero cost. :)

[hornig]

Hi Andreas,

Can you grab the whole jaxb-collada project and try to run the Java version. I probably missed something on the packaging side. Grab the JET demo from Excelsior and see if you can replicate my work.

Hi what_nick,

we are just preparing the new trackjack v0.05 and testing it. from now until the end of the week I won't have time to have a look, perhaps later.

And then I still have to begin with this, so this will take some time. Perhaps you will be faster.

But what happend? The first one seemed to work and you just added the rotation animation.

Andreas

[nlneilson]

FYI, free Excelsior JET licenses are available for non-commercial use. (http://www.excelsior-usa.com/jetfree.html).

Hopefully you can justify zero cost. :)

No.
I can't justify the time it takes to learn to use it.
I eventually would like to have a commercial product.

I don't recall for sure but I don't think the free version will create an .exe that can be exported even with all the Jet logos or whatever even on a trial basis. Jet has some very good programmers but their app is not for me at least at this time.

The .exe must also include a minimal jre. Whatever results from the Ellis/Sun v. Google case is something I don't want to be concerned with.

Neil

[nlneilson]

Neil, ossimPlanet is fairly mature in what it does, and multi-platform (C++ can be one of the most portable things if properly done). I would really love to see some language agnosticism.

I looked at ossimPlanet and was going to compile it but their CMake and
instructions are geared more to Linux than Win.

Is all I need to start is a frame with a globe I can drape the terrain images and dem on. I think that can done with just OpenSceneGraph.
Then port some of the functions/concepts from WWJ.

Neil

[dleskov]

No.
I can't justify the time it takes to learn to use it.

I suspect your experience with our product is a bit dated. We have invested a lot of effort into its ease-of-use improvement in recent years, and prepared some traning materials. For many users, watching the 5-minute Getting Started tutorial (http://www.excelsior-usa.com/tutorials/jet/gs/) is enough.

I eventually would like to have a commercial product.

No problem, you may convert to paid version then. We have had at least one such case already. Note also that we have a special licensing program for startups and very small companies (http://www.excelsior-usa.com/store/jetmb.html).

I don't recall for sure but I don't think the free version will create an .exe that can be exported even with all the Jet logos or whatever even on a trial basis.

Oh, Neil, you must be referring to the Personal Edition that has been discontinued in 2005. What you can get for free today, if your project is genuinely non-commercial, is the Professional Edition, exactly the same binary file, no nag screens, no functional restrictions, etc.

The .exe must also include a minimal jre. Whatever results from the Ellis/Sun v. Google case is something I don't want to be concerned with.

Okay, you've got me here. There is nothing we can do about that.

I however think that Java future is perfectly safe, unless Google, or Facebook, or the Next Big Thing grows big enough to conduct a hostile takeover of IBM, Oracle, and all the other major JCP stakeholders. :)

[nlneilson]

dleskov

As mentioned before Jet is a good product.

I think it's only been ~3 years since I tried it.

what_nick's example from post #2 may have what I ran into.
My .jar was ~4MB and ended up ~30MB .exe.
It could not be transported to another machine.
Maybe because it is a Demo version.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15821898/wws...ver-native.zip

I spent ~5 minutes on your site looking for the current pricing but was just routed
through the same loop. If the price is not out front that raises a flag.

It's Oracle's case against Google regarding Sun's patents, whether the case has merit, that is the problem. That case could set a precedent. It's not a takeover but who can use it and at what price.

Neil

[dleskov]

As mentioned before Jet is a good product.

Thank you, Neil.

I think it's only been ~3 years since I tried it.

what_nick's example from post #2 may have what I ran into.
My .jar was ~4MB and ended up ~30MB .exe.
It could not be transported to another machine.
Maybe because it is a Demo version.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15821898/wws...ver-native.zip

I will check it out. In the meantime you may wish to have a look at http://www.excelsior-usa.com/java-download-size.html - there is a handful of sample apps that you can download.

I spent ~5 minutes on your site looking for the current pricing but was just routed
through the same loop. If the price is not out front that raises a flag.

Something must be seriously wrong either with design or configuration of our Web site. If you go to the Excelsior JET home page (http://www.excelsiorjet.com), do you see the Buy icon in the top menu and the Buy Now link in the three-color box in the upper-right corner? If yes, please click either of them. Do you see the product selector (http://www.excelsior-usa.com/store/jet.html) now? If yes, select the platform, edition and support package and you should see the prices for new purchase, upgrade and support contract renewal right away.

I am 100% open to suggestions on how we could make all this more obvious, without cluttering the page with all possible (platform,edition,support package) combinations.

It's Oracle's case against Google regarding Sun's patents, whether the case has merit, that is the problem. That case could set a precedent. It's not a takeover but who can use it and at what price.

[nlneilson]

If yes, select the platform, edition and support package and you should see the prices for new purchase, upgrade and support contract renewal right away.

After the selections the price is now on the same page.

I will check out the instructions for keeping the file size down and an exportable .exe.

When I tried it before the AOT compiled was noticeably faster in some situations.

Thanks

Neil

[nlneilson]

Neil, ossimPlanet is fairly mature in what it does,

I just noticed that OSSIM changed the license from BSD to GPL in 2009.
Many will not consider anything more restrictive than LGPL.

[hornig]

Hi,

WWJ is about 10mb, then some mb from the reduced jre and the jet stuff. I think anything less than 50mb is fine, because we just send it once to the user and will only replaceit from time to time. Some brojects even send workunits bigger than 100mb, so size is not that big problem.

For me it's more a problem of licence. We can't and don't want to pay for software and don't want to do something against the licence. We are a project, that don't want to be sued ;). Completely free software is prefered.

Andreas

[what_nick]

Hi Guys,

Interesting discussions here is the new package: http://dl.dropbox.com/u/15821898/wwscreen_saver-native.zip. I have attempted to run with Jet removed from my system path and it works fine. Glad to have sparked this discussion.

Regarding ossimplanet, they have visual studio projects as part of the full SVN checkout. I usually use those to build it. It is much much more than a globe, has lots of image processing functionality, can stream images from a UAV and all sorts of jazz. It might be too much for your needs.

Cheers,

whatnick.

[hornig]

hi what_nick,

looking great and rotation works well. perhaps the view is narrow tothe surface, but that's just my opinion.

what I noticed is that when the user interacts with the globe and the animation stops it doesn't restart. perhaps that's usefull to do that after a short inactive time.
and perhaps its usefull to display the nav-menue sothat theuser can navigate easier, and when the interaction is ended they will fade away again.

I did a rough layout what I think will be used for displaying project infomation.
http://dl.dropbox.com/u/20044292/constellation_screensaver_infolayout.png
these will catch infos stored in several files and even system data (date and time, because it's a screensaver :)).
Can this been done with worldwind layers? or how would you do that?

btw: is that your only worldwindcentral logo? and do you think NASA should be linked there as well? because WW is their baby :)

Andreas

[what_nick]

Looks like we are drawing a spammer can forum admin please ban.

Cheers,

whatnick.