Some simple q's and a's

Chip01 · Post #1by **Chip01** » 17.06.2005, 06:38

Hey iam a newbie to celestia and still figure'ing out its amazingness. I have a problem though. When I try and install add-ons mostly Galaxies Nebulas and Earth details to the celestial resorces textures/models/extras etc... I recieve an error message stating the specific directory i chose to zip or add a file into cannot be modified. I was wondering what the problem is and if anyone can help? Iam currently using a mac iBook on OS X Tiger 10.4.
Here is one more simple question i was also wondering what I would need to do to create my own custom add on's? And I have Adobe photoshop CS and image ready, was wondering if I could use those?

maxim · Post #2by **maxim** » 17.06.2005, 10:40

I'm definitely not a Mac user, but that sounds like an administrative rights restriction. Did you login as admin?

maxim

Post #3by **selden** » 17.06.2005, 10:47

You'll need to check the directory ownership and protection and make sure it belongs to your userid.

Any paint program can be used when making an Addon. What matters is the format of the final image. For details, see http://www.lepp.cornell.edu/~seb/celest ... intro.html
Be sure to follow its links to other documentation.

Post #4by **ElChristou** » 17.06.2005, 12:44

Welcome,

For your folder problem as Selden has already said check out the permissions (command-I)...

Photoshop is all good for the image creation but Image Ready won't be usefull in addon creation process. You will also need a 3D software, Cheetah 3D is pretty cool, personally I use also Amapi Pro for modeling...
Try to do some search in the forum and read a maximum of threads where you will find some examples, links to tutorials etc...

Good luck.

Bye

steffens · Post #5by **steffens** » 17.06.2005, 13:19

Could you please consider to make this thread a non-sticky, as there is already a sticky FAQ thread and I don't think there is a real reason for this thread to remain on top forever.

Thanks,
steffen

Post #6by **selden** » 17.06.2005, 13:21

I've made the posting "normal".

Chip01 · Post #7by **Chip01** » 17.06.2005, 20:08

how do i check or change directory ownershiP?!?!

Post #8by **selden** » 17.06.2005, 20:59

Chip,

You need to get some documentation about MacOS which explains files and directories and about userids and file ownership. I don't use a Mac, so I can't help with the details, especially the GUI commands. Sorry.

(MacOS X is based on BSD Unix, so if you open a terminal window, you should be able to use standard Unix commands:
ls -l
to find out the details about a file or directory
chown
to change its ownership and
chmod
to change its protection. However, I suspect this is all a foreign language to you. Sorry I can't help more.)

BlindedByTheLight · Post #9by **BlindedByTheLight** » 17.06.2005, 22:34

Chip - before you get too technical, let me ask you... do you have multiple users on the account?

Sometimes certain files "belong" to some users and not others... one way around that is simply to duplicate the files you are having problems with and the new version will be written automatically with you as an owner.

Chip01 · Post #10by **Chip01** » 17.06.2005, 23:30

no iam the only registerd user

BlindedByTheLight · Post #11by **BlindedByTheLight** » 17.06.2005, 23:41

Chip01 wrote:no iam the only registerd user

Actually (and this is my fault), let me just clarify that again - since the word "registered" makes me wonder if we're talking about the same thing.

On your computer - not regarding any accounts you may have anywhere or web-site registrations - there is only one "user". In other words, if you went to System Preferences and checked the Accounts preference pane, there is only you and no one else? And there never was?

I'm assuming the answer is yes on both - but I just wanted to check. You could try repairing permissions (write back if you don't know what that means) or you could try installing Celestia again fresh. Or a third option is to unzip your files to the desktop and just DRAG them into the right place - even if you have a persmissions problem, the OS might allow you to "authenticate" (ask you for your password) to complete the dragging.

Let me know if that helps and good luck.

Steve

Chip01 · Post #12by **Chip01** » 17.06.2005, 23:57

i tried option 2 and 3 numerous times when you say "repair permissions" youre refering to? iam new to os x ive been a windows user most my life so iam not so good w/ it yet

BlindedByTheLight · Post #13by **BlindedByTheLight** » 18.06.2005, 00:13

Well - first off, bummer that you jump into the Mac world and are hit with this problem. I've been using OS X for several years and only hit it once... oh well...

As for repairing permissions, there is a application called Disk Utility in the utilities folder (in the Applications folder). If you open that, select your hard-drive, you just click "repair permissions" - though, to be honest, I don't think that'll do it.

Also - were you able to verify you are the sole "user" in the system preferences ACCOUNTS pane? Having more than one user created is the only time I have even encountered this problem (not to say it doesn't happen other times)...

As for trying install Celestia fresh - can you detail what you are doing to do that?

Thanks

Chip01 · Post #14by **Chip01** » 18.06.2005, 01:08

yes iam the only registerd user for this comp, and i would uninstall celestia (nothing lost since i cant add add ons) and i would download it again and extract it to my desktop i try to drag add ons into resource folders txture/extras ets and it says i cant modify foler...

BlindedByTheLight · Post #15by **BlindedByTheLight** » 18.06.2005, 01:17

Well, try this (though you may be doing it already. You said you were "extracting" Celestia... I'm hoping that means you are just double-clicking on it, unzipping the disk image, then just mounting the disk image and copying it to the computer. If not, try doing this - and I'll lay the instructions out again.

1) Download Celestia - it should appears as a file with .zip at the end
2) Double-click on the .zip file (OS X has unzipping capabilities built in)
3) The result should be a file with .dmg at the end (that is a disk image)
4) Double-click on the .dmg file - that should "mount" a virtual disk (or volume) on your desktop
5) Option-drag (hold down the option key while you drag) the file to another location, say your home folder or your hard-drive - it doesn't matter. That will force the OS to make a copy (sometimes dragging disk volumes just create short-cuts/aliases instead of copies - and maybe that's where your problem is occuring and you are inadvertantly accessing the locked virtual disk via your dragged-and-dropped alias).

To make sure you are NOT still accessing the mounted virtual disk (a volume you probably don't have permissions to change) via an inadvernatly created short-cut/alias, THROW the virtual Celestia volume in the trash (which will turn into an eject button and UNMOUNT the virtual volume).

If instructions are followed correctly and THAT does not solve your problem then you definitely have some seriously wonky permissions problems going on that I have yet to encounter.

Hope that helps.

Chip01 · Post #16by **Chip01** » 18.06.2005, 01:21

i think thats my problem let me try it

Chip01 · Post #17by **Chip01** » 18.06.2005, 01:24

Yup that was it now i can add add ons, thanks a lot man i owe you one, probably 2

BlindedByTheLight · Post #18by **BlindedByTheLight** » 18.06.2005, 01:26

Well, let me know - it happens to the best of us. My sister had been backing up her data by dragging-and-dropping her entire disk to her CD burning software - and all she was backing up was an alias/short-cut of her disk!

When I tried to explain it to her, she said, "No dummy... look!" and popped in a back-up CD and double-clicked on the "back-up" of her drive - which, of course, was only an alias/short-cut - which opened her drive and made it LOOK like the entire contents were on the CD.

It was a LONG time before I could explain what happened... glad you got it so quick.

BlindedByTheLight · Post #19by **BlindedByTheLight** » 18.06.2005, 01:28

Oops - looks like our e-mails crossed. Glad I could help. I thought it was a mistake when Apple changed the dragging-and-dropping of volumes behavior into making aliases. Sure, it prevented people from accidentally copying an entire hard drive. But you could always hit cancel... and now the finder dragging behavior is inconsistent. Oh well.

Also check out http://www.stevenbinder.net if you want the latest - VERY UNOFFICIAL - Mac build. Totally experimental - but it has full screen which is nice.