On Tue, 21 Dec 2004 04:14:45 -0800, Nick Whitelegg wrote:
> Sounds very interesting. For me the issues are:
>
> - Windows only, using .Net and Direct X. I wonder how hard it would be
> to convert it to C++/OpenGL? That combination of technologies would be
> truly cross platform. It would require a *lot* of time on my part, as
> I haven't programmed OpenGL before but I have done some 3D transform
> stuff as part of my research work a few years ago. If it could be done
> that would be really cool. Maybe I'll try emailing these guys...
>
> - I have more than the required RAM and CPU, but no 3D graphics card.
> Oh well.... are they cheap?
>
> - Embedding in a browser in a cross-platform manner would be really
> good, and would indeed move Freemap to another level.
>
> Thanks,
> Nick
A Radeon 9200SE (from £25-ish) gives reasonably good performance for me.
It's written on Windows for now, but the guys writing it plan to expand to
something more platform-agnostic when the code begins to mature to allow
Linux and Mac OSX users to get involved.
Embedding in a browser was discussed, but is not likely to be worked on
soon due to the performance hit compared with a standalone app. If it
gets rewritten in Java3D, this may become a lot easier for porting into a
browser.
All these topics appear in various formats in the forums, and the
programmers and server admins hang out there regularly. It's also got a
good search facility.
There is a new version planned for January, described as follows :
------------from NASA guy-----------------------------------
We're working on a major new version of World Wind (version 1.3)
that we expect to release in early 2005. Here are the big changes in that
release:
- By default, World Wind will access a different Landsat 7 dataset.
This dataset was generated using a different color enhancement algorithm
and will be correctly georeferenced.
- The default Landsat 7 and SRTM datasets will be served from an improved,
high-availability, highly scalable server infrastructure.
- We are working to add access to more datasets in World Wind, such as a
near-realtime global MODIS mosaic, the U.S. Geological Survey's National
Atlas of the United States, and street and roadway data from the U.S.
Census Bureau.
There may be some other small fixes from our end. Community members are
working on other fixes too, so please chime in if there's something you're
working on for the next release.
---------from NASA guy----------------------------------------------------------
The correctly georeferenced data should help align the elevation data with
the images, e.g. Ben Avon in the Cairngorms appears to be higher on one
side that the other.
The near-realtime MODIS is the same dataset which the monster picture of
Scottish snow posted recently came from,
And the server news sounds excellent for all concerned.
--
pjk
