Celestia Forums

Guys, this is a general thread about the use of scripts, not about writing or discusing the scripts themselves, it's why I have post in Celestia Users.

I'm interested in having the following informations:

Who is using scripts in a regular way?
Which ones?

(if needed you can put some download link to illustrate)
The poll is just to have another view.

Tx.

One interesting side of it that isn't covered in the poll is if you use scripts for things like tours, or if you use them to add functionality to Celestia's core (eg my planetary magnitude script, or finding RA/Decs or phase angles)

On the one hand...

a) I am a BAD cel/celx script customer. Virtually NO need of this!

On the other hand....

b) Of course I use plenty of UNIX shell scripts for many different tasks, like my 'virtualtex' script for VT production, scripts for fancy CVS communication etc.
All usually written by myself.

c) I use lots of PERL scripts for extracting, combining and converting astronomical data (DSO's, binaries,...) for the Celestia distribution. All written by myself.


So, since ElChristou posed his "script" question far too narrow, I cannot add to the polling.

Bye Fridger

Well, I use scripts every week, in astronomy courses that I take care of as voluntary service for many schools.
I use them exclusively to rise interest for astronomy in the pupils, to increase their curiosity for science, to herlp them to understand how big is the Universe and how small we are, etc.
In a few words, to help them go out of the nutshell and be aware of what's surrounding us.
For this I use many tours by Bob (thanks a lot, Bob ) and other authors, together with some of mine.
BTW, I have a theory (conforted by practice on the field) that says that any show should not be longer than 10-15 minutes, otherwise the interest decreases exponentially.
IMHO it's much better to split e.g. the Cassini-Huygens Tour in three or four different ones, that will be shown in the same meeting but with intervals filled with other tours, like Saturn's one, or The Space Conquest, and so on, or speaches about what they are looking at.
In this way I found that both pupils and adults follow the show with more interest .
Bye

Andrea

Malenfant wrote:One interesting side of it that isn't covered in the poll is if you use scripts for things like tours, or if you use them to add functionality to Celestia's core (eg my planetary magnitude script, or finding RA/Decs or phase angles)

The poll is optional, you can tell us here what kind of script you use and why...

t00fri wrote:On the one hand...

a) I am a BAD cel/celx script customer. Virtually NO need of this!

On the other hand....

b) Of course I use plenty of UNIX shell scripts for many different tasks, like my 'virtualtex' script for VT production, scripts for fancy CVS communication etc.
All usually written by myself.

c) I use lots of PERL scripts for extracting, combining and converting astronomical data (DSO's, binaries,...) for the Celestia distribution. All written by myself.


So, since ElChristou posed his "script" question far too narrow, I cannot add to the polling.

Bye Fridger

I was refering to script WITHIN Celestia...

ElChristou wrote:

t00fri wrote:On the one hand...

a) I am a BAD cel/celx script customer. Virtually NO need of this!

On the other hand....

b) Of course I use plenty of UNIX shell scripts for many different tasks, like my 'virtualtex' script for VT production, scripts for fancy CVS communication etc.
All usually written by myself.

c) I use lots of PERL scripts for extracting, combining and converting astronomical data (DSO's, binaries,...) for the Celestia distribution. All written by myself.


So, since ElChristou posed his "script" question far too narrow, I cannot add to the polling.

Bye Fridger

I was refering to script WITHIN Celestia...

But you didn't say so

ElChristou wrote:Guys, this is a general thread about the use of scripts, not about writing or discussing the scripts themselves, it's why I have post in Celestia Users.

I'm interested in having the following informations:

Who is using scripts in a regular way?
Which ones?

(if needed you can put some download link to illustrate)
The poll is just to have another view.

Tx.

Bye Fridger

Er, I think it's pretty obvious given the context that he's taking about Celestia scripts.

t00fri wrote:...But you didn't say so ...

You're right, mea culpa...



(BTW, then you can vote never!)

Malenfant wrote:Er, I think it's pretty obvious given the context that he's taking about Celestia scripts.

While it is really irrelevant, Chris never used the term "Celestia script" Then indeed it would have been obvious. Since I am regularly using quite a number of scripting languages since many years, it was all but obvious from my perspective...Moreover, I am using both UNIX shell scripts and PERL scripts in the context of Celestia.

Bye Fridger

What surprising... No one else use script?

ElChristou wrote:What surprising... No one else use script?

Yes, it's a surprise for me too, mainly because I'm sure that there are many of us using it for educational purposes, e.g. the ones using fgregs lactivities, Bob Hegwood, and many other, I think.
But I see only 3 marks of people using them constantly, and some people that use them, but only sometimes.
Bah! Probably I was mistaking, thinking that Celestia can be considered a BIG educational project, because it doesn't seem to be used in such a way.
Oh well, take it easy!
I enjoy making astronomy courses for pupils using Celestia, and that's enough for me.
BTW, many many thanks to all the clever people that make this possible!
Bye

Andrea

Well I'm all for making scripts to add functionality to Celestia. I'd hope that developers could look at these and incorporate some of them into the core code.

I've not actually used a script to 'tour the universe' yet. I know that I'd probably only be interested in such scripts if they took a maximum of 10-15 minutes to run though.

Malenfant wrote: I've not actually used a script to 'tour the universe' yet. I know that I'd probably only be interested in such scripts if they took a maximum of 10-15 minutes to run though.

Absolutely true, as I told in my previous post:

Andrea wrote:I have a theory (conforted by practice on the field) that says that any show should not be longer than 10-15 minutes, otherwise the interest decreases exponentially.

IMHO it's useless to show twenty Jupiter or Saturn moons, with a lot of surface characteristics for each of them, when showing 5-6 we can equally give a lot of informations on the surface features, but without annoying the public.
The strange thing of this post is that I read many things on scripts, but not on .cel and .celx scripts, that are the argument started by ElChristou.
Can we return to the subject and, please ElChristou, will you modify the title of this post so that it will be clear for all of what we are speaking of?
Bye

Andrea

Okay,

Here's the deal...

I started creating cel scripts simply because it was a very easy way to
enlighten the un-initiated into the wonders of the universe. My tours were
always nothing more than a gentle way to excite people who knew
absolutely *nothing* about the Solar System, the stars, etc.

When these people see a planet or moon displayed through the wondrous
eyes of Celestia, they stop what they're doing and pay attention to the
subject at hand. How often do you see that in *any* classroom today?

What's really amusing is that I am not a teacher or educator of
any kind. I'm simply some Brain-Dead Bozo who happens to love
the wonders of the universe.

I agree that scripts are not much of a contribution to Celestia, but for
someone who has absolutely *no* background in science, mathematics,
or physics, they were a way in which I could contribute something
to the science that I personally love.

Although scripts don't deserve the attention of the developers, they
still serve a valuable purpose in my opinion. For those of us who can
contribute in no other way, they're a great release AND they're a very
easy way to show NON-scientists how much fun the universe really
can be.

I continually have one of my tours running on a display tube in the
lobby where I work. I'm always very much gratified when kids and
their parents see the Earth, Jupiter or Saturn up close for the first
time, and they start asking questions about the displays.

Is there something wrong with that?

Take care, Bob

BrainDead wrote:Is there something wrong with that?

I don't believe anyone's remotely implied that there is anything 'wrong' with your scripts.

ANDREA wrote:...Can we return to the subject and, please ElChristou, will you modify the title of this post so that it will be clear for all of what we are speaking of?

We are just talking about the use of scipt WITHIN Celestia in general, can be .cel, .celx, that's not the point.
I'd like to learn a bit more about the users's habits concerning the topic.
At this point, people are talking about:

- Simple Tours (much for fun)
- Educational activities (Tours more complex, with text etc...)
- New functionality in Celestia via scripts

Something else?

Someone who use scripts in a regular way can tell me how many scripts we are talking about (in his case)?
In general:
How many Tours do we have actually?
How many scripts with scientifical purpose are available?
(note that I'm not refering only in scripts on ML, I suppose there is much more stuff out there...)

BrainDead wrote:...Is there something wrong with that?

On the contrary Bob...

Hi,

I often use cel or celx scripts for my educationnal activities :
- I wrote the 'Deep Impact Mission' script.
- I'm finishing an educationnal addon about the day and night lenght along the seasons. This will be a complete addon (models, textures, ssc, ...) run by a celx script showing different menu interfaces and different activities. There will be also a DVD video made from a cel script with 6 chapters, each one refering to one of the addon activities... All this will be used in many french schools for 8 to ... year old pupils. They will be able to watch one chapter of the video, and then to use Celestia to do the corresponding activity. Just for information, this will be a completely free package and, of course, I won't get paid for that.

ElChristou wrote:In general: How many Tours do we have actually?

I use many .cel and .celx scripts, i.e.:
1- The Orrery (a virtual planetarium that shows the three Kepler laws)
2- Mercury-Venus Tour
3- Earth Tour
4- Mars Tour
5- Jupiter Tour
6- Saturn Tour
7- Uranus-Neptune-Pluto Tour
8- Monsters of the sky (from white dwarfs to colliding galaxies,
pulsars, black holes)
9- Fantasy Tour (using the many addons from a lot of authors,
fantastic worlds in a scientific environment)
10- The Space Coinquest (the history of Space Exploration, from
Sputnik 1 to Cassini-Huygens)
11- The Cassini-Huygens Mission (limited to the Huygens descent to Titan)
12- The Nine Planets (that shows the planet's different speeds and axis inclination)
13- Science and Sci-Fi (many cult Sci-Fi movies, Star Trek, 2001,
Star Wars, etc, shown in an astronomical environment)
14- Power of ten
Some more are under development (most after requests from Science teachers of the schools that host my shows).
Bye

Andrea

For myself, I would have to say that my interest in scripts is using them as tools to add functionality to Celestia or to visualise concepts. Most of my scripts are just little one-off's: created just to see how this is done, or how that would look. I create them, I use them, and then I discard them.

That doesn't diminish the importance of scripting though. I think it emphasises it. Without scripting, Celestia, beautiful as it is, lacks a certain usefulness. It can only show you - you can't make it do anything. With scripts, you gain control over what Celestia shows, and how it shows it.

Those little one-off's aren't unimportant - quite the contrary: they transform Celestia from a passive visual model into an interactive learning environment. It may be a poor analogy, but I will liken Celestia to Google Maps: without scripting it is like the "find" in Google - a useful tool that you may use occasionally. Add scripting and you get the "Directions to" function: now Google changes from a static display to a learning tool. You can find out the best route from here to there and exactly how to travel it. That's what celx does for me.

I do use the tours, but usually only a few times each. I find they tend to be static and after just a few veiwings, I lose interest. Please, that is not a slam against the tours! I love them and I hope more are created. I just mean that once I have seen a tour... well... I've seen it. Personally, I would like to see more people transition from creating .cel to .celx scripts. If that happens, then I think we will see more dynamic and/or interactive tours.