Mitaka Version 1.0 was released

[t00fri]

For people's information, I had some extensive email exchange with the author of Mitaka Plus which is not the same thing as Mitaka. Read for yourself:

...
I'm not the original developper of Mitaka. Mitaka is originally developped by Tsunehiko Kato in 4D2U project at National Astronomical Observertory Japan. I belonged to the 4D2U project,
but unforetunately its source code was closed even among the project members, so I just get its source code and start hacking since this month, after the source code was published as open source under MIT license.

What I did since then was adding constellation figures and porting it to Macintosh environment as Mitaka Plus, personal branch project.

I think Kato did not use any code from your Celestia, because of its GPL license. I think both projects have slightly different target, but I understand people would think that they are in the same category

There was much more in the mail, but the above text fragment is sufficiently general that I think I am allowed to make it public.


Some of you may be interested also about another project that Toshiyuki TAKAHEI developed sort of in parallel with Celestia development, his Solar System Simulator Studio:

http://www.sssim.com/

He actually claims that he implemented many of these features that you may now read on his written roadmap for Mitaka Plus already 6 years ago in his "Solar System Simulator Studio" i.e. BEFORE Celestia....On the other hand before Celestia there was "The Open Universe" of which Celestia "inherited" many of it's characteristic features of the early stages...I doubt that the "Open Universe" was quoted in the "Solar System Simulator Studio"...


Celestia offers practically all of these Mitaka Plus "roadmap features"...so I found it strange that Celestia has nowhere been mentioned/quoted in the Mitaka "environment".

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Anyway, I am slowly learning that the software guys are much more "cavalier" than the scientists as concerns citing other people's work
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Code: Select all

Navigation

    * Smooth transition between target objects.
    * Landing on any target object seamlessly.
    * Change the target objects quickly by shortcut keys.
    * Continuous time progress (other than real-time mode).
    * Trace the Sun for observing eclipse.
    * SpaceNavigator support.
    * Select and query object information by click.
    * Free flight mode.

Additional data

    * Simple way to add minor planets, comets and so on.
    * Simple way to add other Milky-way images.
    * Way to add more astronomical data.
    * Galaxy images visible in the planetarium mode.
    * Apparent magnitude of planets in the planetarium mode.
    * Marks, lines, additional images for presentations.
    * Trails of diurnal motion.
    * Panoramic landscape images.
    * Shooting stars.

Scripting support

    * Scripting support.
    * Auto program editor.
    * Flight path recording.
    * Movie rendering.
    * Customizable shortcut keys.
    * Customizable initial condition and presets.
    * Toggling individual objects.
    * Customizable GUI and Screen Menu.
    * More sophisticated Mitaka.ini setting file.

Rendering quality

    * Anti-aliasing for text rendering.
    * Fade-in/out the labels and objects.
    * Realistic star rendering mode.
    * Low spec environment mode.

GUI

    * More setting dialogs.
    * Internationalization (more languages).


Bye Fridger

[rra]

they entertain different pages/versions of pages it seems:
Look at the bottom of this one:
http://www.systranbox.com/systran/box?s ... am/mitaka/

Thanks Fridger,
the sites were a bit confusing.

I installed the programs and topography sets, all work fine.
To whom it may concern:
both Mitaka and MitakaPlus run smoothly on my Vista (32 bit) system even with "only" 1 GB RAM.

Ren?©

[ElChristou]

It runs well on my Macbook Pro. Are you sure you did not replace the whole folders, but just the files inside the folder?...

What do you mean?

[neo albireo]

uhm.. well... just what is stated clearly in the readme and on the website: that you have to both download mitaka plus as well as the original (i.e. the windows mitaka) and replace some files. works very well.

[Cham]

I reinstalled Mitaka. Their installation procedure sucks, but it's now working on my Mac.

The Mac version isn't finished. Many options aren't functionnal yet. The interface is slow and lacks many navigation options (keyboard shortcuts). However, apparently Itaka has MUCH more menu options than Celestia. Once finished, this app may CRUSH Celestia !

Celestia's future is very uncertain now !

[t00fri]

I reinstalled Itaka. Their installation
procedure sucks, but it's now working on my Mac.

The Mac version isn't finished. Many options aren't
functionnal yet. The interface is slow and lacks many
navigation options (keyboard shortcuts). However,
apparently Itaka has MUCH more menu options than
Celestia. Once finished, this app may CRUSH Celestia !


Celestia's future is very uncertain now !

Cham,

again we agree (not too surprising, perhaps, since we are
both physicists by profession ). See my respective
(pessimistic) remarks at the beginning of this thread.

I think the astrophysical visualization aims AND the achievements of the Mitaka
project (4D2U), http://4d2u.nao.ac.jp/index_E.html,

given the relatively short timespan are impressive. While
Celestia is certainly ahead in a number of convenience
issues, this will surely not remain so!

I can see a much richer innovation potential than what we
managed to implement recently. While they are
systematically preparing for implementing cosmological
N-body simulations at cosmological scales, all reaction I
got during MANY pleas for Cosmo-Celestia were:
"certainly an interesting option...".

Let me recall the "friendly" remark as to Celestia and
Mitaka by Toshiyuki TAKAHEI above:

I think both projects have slightly different target, but I
understand people would think that they are in the same
category

Think about it...I would say this statement has "depth".

Bye Fridger

[Cham]

Here are some screen captures I made of Mitaka in action. The galactic rendering is VERY nice (but very slow too). There's an Oort cloud rendering around our solar system too, which I didn't expected. The coordinates grids are VERY nice. I didn't used my video card options to optimize rendering and add the FSAA yet. I will try it later. Click on the icons below for a much larger version :

[t00fri]

Here are some screen captures I made of Mitaka in action. The galactic rendering is VERY nice (but very slow too). There's an Oort cloud rendering around our solar system too, which I didn't expected. The coordinates grids are VERY nice. I didn't used my video card options to optimize rendering and add the FSAA yet. I will try it later. Click on the icons below for a much larger version :

Cham,

yes I discussed all that above. Clearly there is no free cake here! We all know that a very detailed 3d MilkyWay rendering can be done, but then the speed is so low that the other 10000 galaxies have NO chance. You confirmed the low speed. So did I earlier.

Also they have completely ignored the special challenges of (automatic) mass-rendering. Showing one nice galaxy (that's about all there is) really does not yet impress me very much. Let's see whether 10000+ nice galaxies can be rendered with correct orientation at 50-100 fps with this amount of detail...

Bye Fridger

[hank]

Celestia's future is very uncertain now ! 8O

Celestia's future has always been uncertain, because it's a free-time project. Personally, I'm inclined to think that a little friendly competition might actually improve the prospects for Celestia's future. I hope so.

- Hank

[bh]

Cham, how did you get it to install correctly?

[Cham]

Cham, how did you get it to install correctly?

The installation (on the Mac) really sucks ! I had to install the complete windows package (from here : http://orihalcon.jp/mitakaplus/index_e.html ), then installed the OS X version, and copied ALL the ressources files from the windows version into the corresponding OS X folders, WITHOUT overwriting the OS X files.

The startup sequence is pretty slow (about the same as my fully addons loaded Celestia). The rendering of almost anything on screen is pretty slow too. Navigation with the keyboard is almost non-existent (at least on the actual unfinished Mac version). The font used on screen sucks. I'm yet unable to select any object by clicking on it (uncomplete feature ?). This is really an unfinished product, but it's a VERY nice start anyway. I love the coordinates grids. Grids are MUCH better than in Celestia.

I think it's time to think about adding Selden's style grids to Celestia, with "custom layers" that could be switched ON/OFF on the fly.

I will test this beast further this week.

[chris]

I think it's time to think about adding Selden's style grids to Celestia, with "custom layers" that could be switched ON/OFF on the fly.

Agreed. It's definitely on the road map for 1.5.1. Improving and extending the grids available in Celestia is quite an easy task.

--Chris

[t00fri]

I think it's time to think about adding Selden's style grids to Celestia, with "custom layers" that could be switched ON/OFF on the fly.

Agreed. It's definitely on the road map for 1.5.1. Improving and extending the grids available in Celestia is quite an easy task.

--Chris

I am not so sure whether a good job will be THAT easy.

As I emphasized about 4 years ago, the grid spacing should adapt as function of the FoV (we did that in XEphem with great success) and there should be a general underlying framework for embedding the standard coordinate grid frames.

Bye Fridger

[Cham]

As I emphasized about 4 years ago, the grid spacing should adapt as function of the FoV (we did that in XEphem with great success) and there should be a general underlying framework for embedding the standard coordinate grid frames.

I agree with Fridger. The grid should be scale dependant. Currently, the celestial grid is almost useless. It's not precise enough.

Celestia should also show the coordinates on screen (Dec, RA and distance from Earth) of any selected object, like what Vincent implemented in his Lua EDU Tools. I think that his coordinates feature (and his compass) should be hard coded in Celestia.

The compass is a really great feature. It should be in Celestia's code.

[Cham]

Here's the cosmic scale in Mitaka :



It's pretty nice, all in 3D. But we have some addons which are doing something very similar.

[tech2000]

Celestia should also show the coordinates on screen (Dec, RA and distance from Earth) of any selected object, like what Vincent implemented in his Lua EDU Tools. I think that his coordinates feature (and his compass) should be hard coded in Celestia.

The compass is a really great feature. It should be in Celestia's code.

I will also cast my vote on having these features hardcoded.

Bye, Anders

[hank]

Celestia should also show the coordinates on screen (Dec, RA and distance from Earth) of any selected object, like what Vincent implemented in his Lua EDU Tools. I think that his coordinates feature (and his compass) should be hard coded in Celestia.

The compass is a really great feature. It should be in Celestia's code.

I will also cast my vote on having these features hardcoded.

Bye, Anders

What is the advantage of having these features hardcoded?

- Hank

[Cham]

What is the advantage of having these features hardcoded?

- Hank

Obvious !

What are the advantages to have all the rest hard coded too ?

What are the advantages to have the most important features centralised in the same app ? What are the advantages to have an app independant from all other "layers" ?
What are the advantages to have it NOT hard coded anyway ?

[neo albireo]

The installation (on the Mac) really sucks ! I had to install the complete windows package (from here : http://orihalcon.jp/mitakaplus/index_e.html ), then installed the OS X version, and copied ALL the ressources files from the windows version into the corresponding OS X folders, WITHOUT overwriting the OS X files.

Why didn't you just copy all the ressources files from the OSX version into the corresponding windows folders, WITH overwriting the windows files as suggested in the Readme? Took me less than one minute.

[Cham]

It took me about 30 secs to do it the way I did it. It's just the same.