Celestia Forums

hi all old newbie

so i want to make a version of my own using the best res pics and newest data ... i have done it before years ago using mostly John van Vliet addons with the muti level of pics but are those really the best ? i would think the higher the K number (1,2,4,8,16,32) the better - yes? also is there some place that has all the newest hires pics for the Sol system (making it as real as i can) i know in the last few years we have got great pics of Jupiter Saturn and Pluto (and yes i seen the new pluto 2016 version on mother load - but for others i dont see anything new) ohhh i also want to know Mercury as far as i know does have a limit of knowledge since we havent been there since what 60's/70's so what happened to it ? its not an option and i cant find any LOK files for mercury ..

Process start with only version i can 1.6.1 and strip it down .. if i have a medres pic i delete the lores version .. if there is a hires i delete the medres ... i then in integrate the files mostly John van Vliet files into stock files changing the solarsys.ssc- ect files to include info from addonfile i then put textures and such in correct stock folders (i have found it much faster this way)

my alpha version based on 1.6.1 is about 23 GB (again i am going for the best look for teh Sol system .. granted 12GB of venus surface map is useless since its always clouds but thats the only extra i will be doing everything else i want to be as hires and newest and real meaning LOK is preferable

so ... can anyone give me pointers to where i might find the best files

Added after 5 hours 34 minutes:
current progress of project

Celestia 1.7
removed all lower res images to force quality images
removed all spacecraft (models and all) except Mars Odyssey

Spacecraft
Orion_Nebula's Stage 13 Complete ISS with Texture Pack integrated into ISS file in Extras-standard
Joseph Firestine's Hi-Res JPG Version New Horizons added to Extras-standard
Jestr's V1.3.2 or later Hubble Space Telescope integrated into Hubble file in Extras-standard
FarGetaNik's Pioneers 10&11 and Voyager 1 & 2 added to Extras-standard

Sol System
Runar Thorvaldsen's Complete Version with Patch A portrait of our sun in addons
John van Vliet's 32K Mercury Surface Map Level 0-5P4 integrated into solarsys.ssc
John van Vliet's 128k Venus Surface Map Level 0-7P16 integrated into solarsys.ssc
John van Vliet's 64K Moom Surface Map Level 0-6P8 integrated into solarsys.ssc
John van Vliet's 32K Mars Surface Map Level 0-5P2 integrated into solarsys.ssc
John van Vliet's High Poly Deimos & Phobos integrated into solarsys.ssc

I do not understand what is the meaning of creating another hodgepodge of addons? For these purposes there is already "Celestia Origin". Would be better to help develop it.

hodgepodge like Celestia Origin is not what im going for Celestia Origin is a complete mess (sorry to say) all it is is a bunch of addon dumped into the extra folder making is slower... if your replacing the mercury textures you have to delete the old ones change the ssc files to point to the new ones .. the more you add to the extra the more double work the PC has to do

Celestia Origin might be up to date but its such a mess not even sure where to start to fix it plus i dont read what is it.. a Russian readme file(?) so its useless to me and why is there a bat file to install? Celestia is a stand alone folder you dont have to install anything just have the folder

for me its easier to start from the ground up cuz i want it REAL where CO is the "latest discoveries and hypotheses" i dont want hypotheses as they are not fact

FCVPI99, < You know too little about my project. In "Celestia Origin", by the way, strict quality standards are in force. Hypothetical objects are very few and all are disabled by default. Not to mention the fact that most of the standard catalogs are replaced by our versions. Untested hodgepodge was often obtained from our predecessors. And it is very likely that she will have followers.

think this is the best i have seen messenger.jhuapl.edu's 23K(?) Mercury Surface Map its a lil slow since its a 760 mb PNG but its the best looking witch my point is to do real looking planets. I wanted to use John van Vliet's mercury map cuz it works better and faster but its more of a black and white image and this is a color one

Added after 2 hours 40 minutes:
ok so my OCD got the best of me i nixed the project and am starting over with BOTH version 1.6.1 and 1.7
this project will have parts to it the first part is getting the "major" sol system components fixed up and updated
my version will put quality above all else within reason i wish i could use the mercury texture pictured above but at 760mb for a single picture it just slows it down way to much - now i have a old POS Nvidia GT630 so i fig if my GPU can run it 99% of them will - LOK will be used always (honestly i wish i knew how to set it so you cant even turn LOK off) for textures i will use the best and delete all those below i will also be editing SSC files with addon data (i have noticed the more thats in the extra folder the slower it is to load .. and also why load the data for a planet just to have it read another SSC saying Modify so it will all be integrated as much as i can that being said celestia is a stand alone folder meaning all you need is the Celestia program folder and you can run it from anywhere hard drive CD/DVD USB even so im hopping once done i will somehow share the big old file (expecting about 20-30 GB) after Sol system is updated i will try to make heads or tails about the Celestia Origin files being they say its the most up to date i will go though and add there data files to the stock ones i have seen in their files deleted stars so i will hunt though and delete the entries i will be triple checking everything to make sure yes its fact or no its theory --- maybe by the time im done i will have some useful updated files for them to have (?)

i will be doing this project no matter what but if this isnt wanted here let me know as i plan on sharing updates and pictures

I've been sick of Celestia's lack of updates since a couple of years and started my own project updated both data and textures/models for the whole solar system. I tried to process the textures to be as close to reality as possible. For Mercury I can point to this textures: https://fargetanik.deviantart.com/art/Mercury-Texture-Map-16k-708333315

When dealing with such huge textures you need to use virtual textures to keep decent performance.

Unfortunately I've come across some obstacles and lost my motivation to work on my Project Echoes recently...

FarGetaNik TY for the link il DLed and will test it out

virtual textures those are the ones with level 0 level 1 ect right? cuz those are the ones i kinda prefer

Added after 10 minutes 1 second:
sorry Art Blos didnt mean to offend you its just OCD wise your work is just to messy for me lots of work has to be done behind the ssc files not just stuck in the extras folder . i mean hell anyone can do that - i would have checked out your version but being half the program type files are missing like the exe it really doesnt even work for me maybe its cuz im windows and not linux im not sure. the end result is i cant even open C/O so to me its useless

Added after 3 hours 52 minutes:
spacecraft is slow going as i have to check if each one is still "in the air" im following Stock way and using the extras-standard folder for spacecraft - some in stock data folder also but im now thinking for spacecraft i should add a data folder in the addons so as you can removed all traces once satellite is gone -- i will be reworking that .. i think its only 3 spacecraft that have data files in the data folder
so far this is what i have done to version 1.6.1 - 1.7 is pretty much the same

Something I want to make sure that you understand...

Celestia Origin is very similar to what you are attempting to work on, except Celestia Origin involves the modifications being spread out, with some being in the extras, and others being directly implemented into the solarsys.ssc file and other core files. It is NOT all in the extras folder as you think. And Celestia Origin is by no means a mess...it is actually very organized. All default textures have been replaced by newer and higher resolution textures if possible, and the same is true with the 3D models. The reason Celestia Origin uses a .bat file is because it basically REPLACES your default Celestia installation with the provided files. This is what makes it so hard to implement it into already heavily modified installations, such as mine.

yes i know
i guess i just dont like the bat thing and the wired header on most all the text files really all you need to do is take all the folders that have changed and overwrite and or copy the models and texture files and edit the data files and really when you have this kinda project size why not add the what 5 mb for in "system/exe files"

so to me it wont ever be used

really i think they should have just set it up as a stand alone Celestia folder executable .... you dont have to install anything .. this is what you need .. why not just have the torrent file they do this (see pic) ... you can have many Celestia installs .. a stock version .. you personal version .. Star trek Version Star wars ect ect

if C-O would have done a full torrent and didnt have the alien writing in the files id have no problem helping them integrate the extras files into the main body files - one point i am trying to fix is the time it takes to load the extras folder ... the less that in it the faster it starts at least i noticed that with every Celestia i have used with alot in the addons


plus .. building Celestia is something to do

FCVPI99 wrote:really i think they should have just set it up as a stand alone Celestia folder executable .... you dont have to install anything .. this is what you need .. why not just have the torrent file they do this (see pic) ... you can have many Celestia installs .. a stock version .. you personal version .. Star trek Version Star wars ect ect

We have certain reasons why we do not.

great grandma always said never give at the door always at the office and never click on bat files you have no clue about in the days of spyware malware and data mining you never know what you can be clicking - i guess its just me who is still old school and doesnt click on files i dont know that have come in a torrent

FCVPI99 wrote:great grandma always said never give at the door always at the office and never click on bat files you have no clue about in the days of spyware malware and data mining you never know what you can be clicking - i guess its just me who is still old school and doesnt click on files i dont know that have come in a torrent

The text of any bat-file can be viewed through Notepad. And fact that some are afraid of torrents - this is entirely their problem.

@FCVPI99

I believe I may not have been clear enough in our PMs.
I should have been explicit.

http://celestia.simulatorlabbs.com/Downloads/Celestia-Origin/Celestia_Origin_2017_12_30.zip

Is a ready run Celestia-Origin because the whole bat file thing bothered me as well.
I also run a really weirdly setup system it wouldn't have worked on.

I did the setup manually so that others who are learning would not have to deal with it.

Why don't you grab that one and start over with what you have learned so far.
I believe that may give you a better grasp of what the project has been trying to accomplish.

It doesn't work well for me, but I work weird.
You can replace or supplement the executables with any of the Celestia V1.70 variants and it should work.
The fork I have in it are fully statically linked VS2013 compiles specifically meant to be complete stand alones.
32 & 64 bit exe files are present to match whatever system you are running.

I hope that helps clear things up for you.


Janus.

good looking out .. ya i must have missed the C-O version (dont know how) cuz i DLed 1.7 from your place

Added after 1 hour 23 minutes:
thanks Janus works pretty ok this IS pretty much what i was going for!! although .... a startup time of over 20 seconds on a ryxen 5 is a lil much ... reading all the extra ssc files just like my first mod did back in the day -- i know by integrating the ssc files into the main ones it will be much faster .. Art Blos i do have the time and will i can integrate them for you (do i really have to say for free?) although some of the folder names have me stumped like inactive in the root and then again in the extras folder i see slot of file folders named the same as ssc in the data folder they can be combined like asteroids and comets .. i understand you have a reason for them in the extras is it time to do it ? is it they are still up in the air as to if it could be named something else is another list ect ... i have always loved celestia and i loved how there were all these great and better addons in the what 15 years since i played with it alot has changed it seems no one really minds it much matter .. clestiamotherload seems to have removed alot and i remember pages full of jupiters and saturns extra and new moons that i cant find anymore ... if i can spend my time making your version faster for others i call that time well spent although i will be doing my own decked out version of C-O aka adding all the hires vts from CML but like i said if i can help you i will ... just let me know

now its time to install the VTs for earth in my 1.6.1 and 1.7 versions and test them

FCVPI99 < We do not need a different file structure or other versions. We will develop the collection as we see fit. In our project, NEVER and NOTHING is not done without a reason. Want to make your addon-pack - it's your thing. I originally wanted to say that you are unlikely to be able to create something unique and reliable from the scientific point of view (your screenshot of Mercury is proof of this, it's enhanced colors). For a project like ours, you need to not only unite your favorite add-ons, but also, check their quality, be able to improve them yourself, create something new, understand astronomy well, and, most importantly, invest your soul. None of the above I have not yet seen.

At this conversation I finish.

your right i wont be able to make something as complete as Celestia Origin with stuff from the motherload .. so il shift my project to Celestia Origin "Optimized" kinda has a nice ring to it

i have basically given up on this site so ....

i do have a qt5 build - and working on fixing a BIG bug

the github code is my current working code for linux 64 bit

after fixing the celestia browser CRASH issue i am planning on removing 3ds support , it is ANCIENT and cmod is much better

The reason Celestia Origin uses a .bat file is because it basically ...

and this is a MICROSOFT WINDOWS ONLY!!! thing

this is the other reason i am no longer active after last week

That windows only thing is part of why I posted the celestia origins ready to run.
Drop any OS executable into its root and it should run just the way it is.
Why make an addon when you can do a proper makeover even easier, and it just works.

@John Van Vliet
Can you contact me please.
I am having some problems getting a working environment to compile celestia under linux in a VM going.
I will soon be caught up on work and getting back to my hobbies for a while, and would like to make some progress this time.
I am probably caught behind my own lack of knowledge, and linux confuses me on so many levels.

Janus.

john your leaving celestia? that sucks i love ur addons!! the VT's are great
im hoping to crunch a mid size 1.9 GB mercury pic into a VT .. thats if i can find software that will work i ran into a problem in the VT for dummies guide one if the inductions just wont work the way its wrote