Bugs in 1.4.0 final

[fsgregs]

EDITED:

Chris et al:

I downloaded 1.4.0 final for Windows today for testing and found the following (so far):

* the date menu is still frozen. We cannot manually change the date at all.

* the program opens for the first time with almost all of the render options turned off. There are no clouds, no galaxies (including the Milky Way), no nebula, no ring shadows or eclipse shadows and no night side lights. The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene, and the FOV is 20, which is very close in. A new user loading Celestia for the first time will not see a beautiful night sky come into view, but will mostly see a black screen.

Most first time users will not know how or what to change in the render menu until they become familiar with the program and read the user manual. We should at least give them something more impressive to view when they first encounter Celestia space.

I recommend changing the start. cel to turn on the key options, set magnitude to at least 7.00 - 8.00, and FOV at perhaps 35.

Sorry to have to report all this. I too had hoped 1.4.0 final was free of bugs.

Regards,

Frank

PS - back in September or so, Brendan identified a keystroke combo for toggling nebulae labeling that he claimed was not in use. He reportedly coded it into CVS. I forgot what keys he told me he used, but if true, than there may still be a keystroke combo that you could assign to toggling nebulae labels.

[symaski62]

EDITED:

Chris et al:

1)* the program opens for the first time with almost all of the render options turned off. There are no clouds, no galaxies (including the Milky Way), no nebula, no ring shadows or eclipse shadows and no night side lights. The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene, and the FOV is 20, which is very close in. A new user loading Celestia for the first time will not see a beautiful night sky come into view, but will mostly see a black screen.

2)I recommend changing the start. cel to turn on the key options, set magnitude to at least 7.00 - 8.00, and FOV at perhaps 35.

3)PS - back in September or so, Brendan identified a keystroke combo for toggling nebulae labeling that he claimed was not in use. He reportedly coded it into CVS. I forgot what keys he told me he used, but if true, than there may still be a keystroke combo that you could assign to toggling nebulae labels.

1) "Ctrl + Y" --> "?" & "." ZOOM --> "[" & "]"
The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene
OK

2) ^^ OK
windowed mode
1024 x 768
25?° 46' 54.9" (1.00x)

Full Screen
800 x 600
22?°26' 51.5" (1.00x)

1024 x 768
28?° 30' 12.5" (1.00x)

1280 x 960
35?° 13' 45.5" (1.00x)

3) OK CVS "update" ^^

celestia 1.4.0 final 31/12/2005

[t00fri]

EDITED:

Chris et al:

I downloaded 1.4.0 final for Windows today for testing and found the following (so far):

* the date menu is still frozen. We cannot manually change the date at all.

* the program opens for the first time with almost all of the render options turned off. There are no clouds, no galaxies (including the Milky Way), no nebula, no ring shadows or eclipse shadows and no night side lights. The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene, and the FOV is 20, which is very close in. A new user loading Celestia for the first time will not see a beautiful night sky come into view, but will mostly see a black screen.

Most first time users will not know how or what to change in the render menu until they become familiar with the program and read the user manual. We should at least give them something more impressive to view when they first encounter Celestia space.

I recommend changing the start. cel to turn on the key options, set magnitude to at least 7.00 - 8.00, and FOV at perhaps 35.

Sorry to have to report all this. I too had hoped 1.4.0 final was free of bugs.

Regards,

Frank

PS - back in September or so, Brendan identified a keystroke combo for toggling nebulae labeling that he claimed was not in use. He reportedly coded it into CVS. I forgot what keys he told me he used, but if true, than there may still be a keystroke combo that you could assign to toggling nebulae labels.

Frank:

(1) I just checked 1.4.0final for Windows and can unfortunately confirm your findings. The Windows interface was entirely in Chris' hands, but I even reported these time setting problems before 1.4.0final. Since Chris often does not care to acknowledge mails, it remains correspondingly unclear whether he has read something or not...

Anyway: while you may partially change the date by overtyping, the calender tool is missing in the date line and the date text is NOT inverted, hence remains unreadable! That's the essence of what I reported earlier (without "echo") . Things are still fine in FT1.2.

(2) As to the initial option values, I also agree. In FT1.2, I had for that reason set the essential options in start.cel, which however is also not a good solution. Chris does not like this possibility at all! The reason is that any settings in start.cel would overwrite all settings that are saved on exit.

But except Windows users typically want to start using such a complex program as Celestia without reading a bit first in the manual, it's not that bad. How can people effectively use the controls of Celestia without learning the operations first?

Bye Fridger

[t00fri]

1) "Ctrl + Y" --> "?" & "." ZOOM --> "[" & "]"
The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene
OK

I have to point out this very rare /complete/ English sentence of our friend symaski62!!! What I find most remarkable is that this sentence leads me to suspect that its author is in pretty good command of the English language...

Bye Fridger

[brokfn]

I'm afraid he copied it from the post above...
Bye,
Brokfn

[t00fri]

I'm afraid he copied it from the post above...
Bye,
Brokfn

Indeed....what a pity

Bye Fridger

[chris]

EDITED:

Chris et al:

I downloaded 1.4.0 final for Windows today for testing and found the following (so far):

* the date menu is still frozen. We cannot manually change the date at all.

I don't see this problem at all . . . The date menu works just fine for me. What do you mean by 'frozen'? After I fixed a couple focus problems reported by brokfn, everything seemed to be working fine. Which version of Windows are you using?

* the program opens for the first time with almost all of the render options turned off. There are no clouds, no galaxies (including the Milky Way), no nebula, no ring shadows or eclipse shadows and no night side lights. The stars are set at magnitude 5.00 which places only a few hundred or so in the scene, and the FOV is 20, which is very close in. A new user loading Celestia for the first time will not see a beautiful night sky come into view, but will mostly see a black screen.

Most first time users will not know how or what to change in the render menu until they become familiar with the program and read the user manual. We should at least give them something more impressive to view when they first encounter Celestia space.

I agree that more should be turned on. We'll have to fix this in a maintenance release.

I recommend changing the start. cel to turn on the key options, set magnitude to at least 7.00 - 8.00, and FOV at perhaps 35.

Sorry to have to report all this. I too had hoped 1.4.0 final was free of bugs.

I appreciate the bug report. I'd hoped that most of these things would have been found in the prereleases. It looks like we'll have to make a maintenance release of the Windows version.

PS - back in September or so, Brendan identified a keystroke combo for toggling nebulae labeling that he claimed was not in use. He reportedly coded it into CVS. I forgot what keys he told me he used, but if true, than there may still be a keystroke combo that you could assign to toggling nebulae labels.

Maybe. But, I didn't care much to add yet another arbitrary key binding to Celestia . . . Something must be done to simplify the keyboard interface.

--Chris

[selden]

I have no problems setting Celestia's time on this system.

I agree with Fridger that Celestia shouldn't change saved settings.
It'll have to detect when it's a first-time installation.

512MB, 2.4GHz P4, WinXP Pro SP2
128MB FX5200, ForceWare v66.81
Celestia v1.4.0 final

[chris]

(1) I just checked 1.4.0final for Windows and can unfortunately confirm your findings. The Windows interface was entirely in Chris' hands, but I even reported these time setting problems before 1.4.0final. Since Chris often does not care to acknowledge mails, it remains correspondingly unclear whether he has read something or not...

Anyway: while you may partially change the date by overtyping, the calender tool is missing in the date line and the date text is NOT inverted, hence remains unreadable! That's the essence of what I reported earlier (without "echo") .

I replaced the normal Windows date picker with a custom one that allows setting the year earlier than 1752. I didn't bother to reimplement that calendar tool as it would have taken more time to code than I cared to spend on a non-essential feature. On my system, the date text *is* inverted, exactly as in the normal Windows date picker. Could you send me a screen shot? I did not see your bug report on this issue (not disputing that you sent one; it may have gotten lost amid the flurry of 1.4.0 release email.)

Things are still fine in FT1.2.

. . . unless you want to set a year earlier than 1752.

(2) As to the initial option values, I also agree. In FT1.2, I had for that reason set the essential options in start.cel, which however is also not a good solution. Chris does not like this possibility at all! The reason is that any settings in start.cel would overwrite all settings that are saved on exit.

We need to revisit the way that default values are handled. It looks to me like the Windows version is overriding some of the settings from celestia.cfg, which is not what we want at all. A short term solution is to change the Windows defaults in winmain.cpp. Longer term, we need to revisit how startup settings are handled. The priority should be:

1. start.cel
2. saved settings
3. celestia.cfg
4. built-in defaults

Generally this is how things work now, but at least on Windows, some built-in defaults are overriding celestia.cfg settings. It'd be nice to make this stuff cross-platform, so there's only one place to break it.

--Chris

[t00fri]

I replaced the normal Windows date picker with a custom one that allows setting the year earlier than 1752. I didn't bother to reimplement that calendar tool as it would have taken more time to code than I cared to spend on a non-essential feature. On my system, the date text *is* inverted, exactly as in the normal Windows date picker. Could you send me a screen shot?

OK, here we go:

The first screenshot is from a freshly downloaded and installed 1.4.0final for Windows XP:



On the left you see how the date line looks, with its NON-inverted text. I am able to overwrite the numbers but did not manage to change the month!

EDITED: meanwhile I know that it works via the up/down cursor keys. Yet I can't see what I am dialing

That's the essence of what I reported here on Dec 17th already (1.4.0pre9 bug thread):
In contrast, the time line (right screenshot) works correctly.

...except that there is a dark cursor type bar visible right over the portion of the date that may be changed. So I cannot see the previous date underneath that dark bar....

Moreover my local timezone displayed in Windows sounds also incorrect: WEST. I read this as West EuropeanStandard Time which usually stands for GMT not GMT+1. My time zone is rather CET (CentralEuropean time) = GMT+1.

Here is a reference

http://wwp.greenwichmeantime.com/info/timezone.htm

That's also how the Linux flavors correctly display it...

In addition the time setting interfaces of the Linux flavors are considerably more "complete" than the "spartanic" windows dialog above:

celestia-kde:



and for celestia-gtk and celestia-gnome



There are a number of features that I personally value more than being able to dial in a date before 1752:

a) choice of local time and UTC time input!
b) very convenient GUI operation
c) indication of light travel time delay etc...

(2) As to the initial option values, I also agree. In FT1.2, I had for that reason set the essential options in start.cel, which however is also not a good solution. Chris does not like this possibility at all! The reason is that any settings in start.cel would overwrite all settings that are saved on exit.

We need to revisit the way that default values are handled. It looks to me like the Windows version is overriding some of the settings from celestia.cfg, which is not what we want at all. A short term solution is to change the Windows defaults in winmain.cpp. Longer term, we need to revisit how startup settings are handled. The priority should be:

1. start.cel
2. saved settings
3. celestia.cfg
4. built-in defaults

Generally this is how things work now, but at least on Windows, some built-in defaults are overriding celestia.cfg settings. It'd be nice to make this stuff cross-platform, so there's only one place to break it.

--Chris

I certainly agree that we should be careful about the hierarchy of possibilities to place initial options. But the present Windows 1.4.0final approach is definitely worse than my (brute force) start.cel setting of most essential options in FT1.2 ... People won't see much sensible stuff initially in 1.4.0 final


Bye Fridger

[fsgregs]

Chris:

I have discovered that the date display cannot be changed in 1.4.0 final when trying to use the numeric keyboard (with num lock on). I now realize that since you mapped that keyboard to move the screen view in Celestia, it may not be usable for entering dates or numbers in Celestia.

I can change the date when using the numbers at the top of the main keyboard. I was able to change all dates and times.

Sorry for any confusion

Frank

[t00fri]

Chris:

I have discovered that the date display cannot be changed in 1.4.0 final when trying to use the numeric keyboard (with num lock on). I now realize that since you mapped that keyboard to move the screen view in Celestia, it may not be usable for entering dates or numbers in Celestia.

I can change the date when using the numbers at the top of the main keyboard. I was able to change all dates and times.

Sorry for any confusion

Frank

How did you change the month 'Dec'??

Bye Fridger

[jdou]

I upgraded my driver NVIDIA 78.01 to the new 81.98 release.
And now, I have a nice red Earth when I use OpenGL 2.0 path
(Info OpenGL driver displays 2.0.1)
I tried with the 1.4.0pre9, pre9-F and pre10 (I didn't find the 1.4.0 final ) with the same result
So I came back to the 78.01 and my Earth is again blue as I like

[t00fri]

I upgraded my driver NVIDIA 78.01 to the new 81.98 release.
And now, I have a nice red Earth when I use OpenGL 2.0 path
I tried with the 1.4.0pre9, pre9-F and pre10 (I didn't find the 1.4.0 final ) with the same result
So I came back to the 78.01 and my Earth is again blue as I like

I just upgraded under Linux the NVIDIA driver from 7676 to the new 8178, and everything is perfectly fine under the OpenGL 2.0 rendering path (and all others, too). No red planets etc.

Bye Fridger

[cartrite]

You can use the left and right arrow keys to navagate back and forth.
The up and down arrow keys change the settings you are on.
The tab key will move you to different section of the menu. The date menu that is.

This was disscused in a thread on 1.4-pre9. I think.

Happy Holidays

cartrite

[jdou]

I just upgraded under Linux the NVIDIA driver from 7676 to the new 8178, and everything is perfectly fine under the OpenGL 2.0 rendering path (and all others, too). No red planets etc.

Is a problem with the graphic card possibilities or a ascending problem of compatibility for the new releases ?
These drivers are, normaly, made for a range of same graphic card type ?
ie: from the powerless FX card to the powerfull FX card
No ?

[t00fri]

I just upgraded under Linux the NVIDIA driver from 7676 to the new 8178, and everything is perfectly fine under the OpenGL 2.0 rendering path (and all others, too). No red planets etc.

Is a problem with the graphic card possibilities or a ascending problem of compatibility for the new releases ?
These drivers are, normaly, made for a range of same graphic card type ?
ie: from the powerless FX card to the powerfull FX card
No ?

Don't really know. I am a pure consumer, as to NVIDIA's drivers . They usually work for me. My card is a FX 5900Ultra/ 256 MB

Bye Fridger

[jdou]

Thanks Fridger, I will stay with my old 78.01

[cartrite]

jdou,

If you haven't rolled back your driver yet check to see if you get a red globe for a texture that has no spec map. I was checking into this about a month ago when others thought it was a Windows Update causing the problem. The red globe did not appear all the time with the new driver. I think it had something to do with how many simultanious textures were loaded or if a spec map was loaded. I ended up going back to 78.01.

cartrite

[jdou]

I made again some tries with the 81.98 version of NVIDIA driver and the OpenGL 2.0 Rendering path.

Yes, the problem with this version seems to come from Earth-Specular maps...but not only

If I disable specular maps, Earth is blue (with normal map, BlueMarble or JMII tiles)
but if I check the box "Night Side Ligths" Earth becomes red
So I can toggle between red/blue Earth just by check/uncheck the Night Lights.

Of course I have no problem with Mercury, Venus, Mars....

With the version 78.01 all works ok, but perhaps without the full features of the OpenGL 2.0 ?