Celestia Forums

Hello all,

I'm a new user to Celestia. First tried it 2 days ago and I must say I'm overwhelmed. Congratulations to Chris and all contributers out there for one of the most beautiful pieces of software ever developed.

However, I do have a question. I want to populate Celestia with about everything I can find. Spacecrafts, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies,... and of course beautify planet, moon, asteroids, comets,... textures. I gather Celestia gets progressively more entertaining (and educative) as I add new elements to it. Unfortunately I'm not programming or artistic oriented. As such I have to rely on others work.

But the problem is that on these past two days I've found literally hundreds of sources. I'm completely lost. Some of them are nothing but copies or slight deviations from others work, while some others don't seem to rely on factual data even though the model is a real one. Others (namely textures) offer no single explanation or help on how to install.... in short, I can't seem to be able to organize myself. I'm pretty sure there's a lot of serious, factual work out there. But I can't seem to be able to separate the good from the bad.

Can someone please help me by at least pointing me out to some kind of aggregator website where add-ons are at least properly catalogued? I'll try to go over the documentation and study it myself (installing textures is no simple task as I first thought). But at least I need help organizing myself.

TIA,
Mario

Hi Mario
Wellcome to the Celestia forums.

The problems that you had referred to are known . I've prepared some Feature requests on my website to try solving them at least partially.

In the Celestia Development Forum there is a thread discussing about some aspects of the problem.

Personally (and I think that most of the Celestia Users does the same) I test the 3rd party add-on files in separate Celestia installations.

But I prefer to use only the official package because all the material is surely tested and approved by the development team.

Some kind of testing and approval of add-on is advisable like described in this thread

I'm sorry but I have your same problem, there are several websites with a lot of add-on material maintained, catalogued, organized and updated with great effort. So addressing you a website instead of another is difficult.

I think that only with the cooperation of the add-on creators and the creation of a team of contributors that helps the development team this problem should be solved.

To start solving the problem someone must to share a lot of webspace with reasonable bandwidth to create a centralized repository. After that this patron must give to the contributors team people the access rights to allow uploading and updating of the contained material.

I think that sooner or later to collect the resources necessary to allow further project growth, some kind of subscription will be a must.

Bye - Paolo

There are at least two sites with lists of add-ons and comments about them. Please take a look at Arnaud's Database at http://arnaud.macron.free.fr/recherche.php and Mike's list of downloads at http://mikecelestia.bravehost.com/


Does this help?

Thanks both for your replies.

Those two threads were very interesting Paolo. Some of your suggestions are thought provocative . Particularly the one about real time multi-user space exploration... with chat and all.

Although not a good thing as it is, I did find some comfort in knowing that the central repository I was looking for doesn't exit. It at least tells me that after all my google searching techniques are still working

Thanks also Selden for sharing those links. But I think you don't credit yourself enough . While inspecting your links I came up with this precious one http://www.lns.cornell.edu/~seb/celestia/ which I believe you are the author. Thank you for such an interesting and wealthy web page.

As a final note I will try and be carefull with what I choose to download. Concerning the information Celestia delivers, I'm more interested in its accuracy and its wealth, than I am in the aesthetics. Although, of course, the later plays a big role on what makes this program so enjoyable. A central repository would be indeed a great aiding tool for any of us. Both newcomers and veterans. It would also help the developers to focus more on what has yet to be done instead of keep doing the same thing over and over again. At this point it comes to mind, as an example, the sheer number of "different" Mars textures (let's face it, too many, too identical), when for instance a very interesting object has none; Miranda, which currently looks disappointingly... polished. (as a side note, is there any bump map fan artist out there? Miranda is surely a challenge).

I understand the technical difficulties behind such a project. I do "own" server space (500MB with a 50MB SQL Server database) at Readyhosting.com. I'm a web developer working mostly at ASP with VBScript supported by SQL Server. That space has been left unattended for an year now and I will consider giving some use to it if Celestia grows in me like it seems it is doing. But obviously 500MB are just a tiny speckle of what would be needed to hold, say one set of 16k textures for all solar system objects... let alone everything else that would be needed on a central repository.

However, If I do get hooked to Celestia I'll surely do my part by trying to mimic such a repository on my sad 500Mb space At least create a set of downloadable files that can be used by any newcommer to complement their first Celestia installation... something that quite frankly I've been havng an hard time doing.

Mario

Mario,

I try to avoid making comments about the links in my list, so I directed you to sites that do. I knew some of my pages were listed on both

One of the problems with putting together a set of files "to complement their first Celestia installation" is in deciding what to include. I think it really depends on the person's interests. Celestia includes a little bit of everything (except colorful models of deep space objects ). To complement that, I think, would require several different sets of downloads, each concentrating on a different aspect of outer space.

Mario,

I hate to be presumptious; however with that much space available, you could make a great contribution by being the first person to host a complete virtual texture of the giant NASA bluemarble texture. The request for these files has been repeatedly voiced in the forums but as far as I know none are currently being hosted. I have a working copy based on Fridger's recommended color corrections and dxt1c formatted, which weighs in at a hefty 90MB when zipped (341MB unzipped). I'm on a T1 and if no one else is able to easily upload a copy then I would be more than willing. I would just need an ftp login which you could send via email or private message. If any of the top notch graphic art whizzes on the forum are willing to upload their version - that might be preferable.

cheers,
Walton

Mario wrote:Hello all,

However, I do have a question. I want to populate Celestia with about everything I can find. Spacecrafts, moons, stars, nebulae, galaxies,...

But the problem is that on these past two days I've found literally hundreds of sources. I'm completely lost.
Can someone please help me by at least pointing me out to some kind of aggregator website where add-ons are at least properly catalogued?
Mario

Hello Mario.
I have the same problem when i discovered this incredible program, so i try to do for me a little catalog of the add ons, with some little explanations (install, comments etc.) It place this work-on-progress on line, see below.
O, it's in french, my language, but pics and url are speaking to everybody, i hope.

And so, of course, Selden's site is THE great reference, with tons of explanations.
There was on Bruckner's site lot of addons (w comments) but it was breaking down: some of them would be mirrored on BillyBob one, and maybe others: when i known were they are, i'll add their address on my pages.

If this can help,
Jeam

wcomer wrote:I hate to be presumptious; however with that much space available, you could make a great contribution by being the first person to host a complete virtual texture of the giant NASA bluemarble texture.

I surely can do this Walton.

You can reach me at mariofig@netcabo.pt in order to dicusss the details. The current website is at http://www.marfig.com. The current website theme and design hasn't been touched for nearly an year. I can easily create a webpage for the hosting of that file and with it lay the grounds for a more complete website.

Mario