Mac OS X Quantum Simulations 66
Jeremy Lee writes "There are some 'educational' apps that transcend the merely interesting, and expand you mind with the force of a crowbar in the cerebellum. Celestia is one. Atom in a box is another. I keep it handy on my new iBook to blow the minds of chemist friends. It only runs on PowerPC Macs, but it's almost a justification for getting one. It should be used in schools to teach chemistry." Celestia is also great (and available for other platforms) ... I couldn't download it from the main link on the page, but was able to get it from SF.net. But if you really want to amaze your friends, turn your Mac into a Desktop Cray.
Desktp Cray (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Desktp Cray (Score:4, Funny)
The only thing missing are the Blinkenlights.
modules & security, etc. (Score:4, Funny)
ohhh Sneakers! (Score:2, Funny)
honestly though Celestial is an amazing program (esp for an alpha release) and is quite accessible and interesting to non-astrologists, like myself
Mind-bending visual bug (Score:4, Funny)
http://kato.iki.fi/htraEwolloF.jpg [kato.iki.fi]
On MacOSX 10.1.5, Celestia apparently wraps a realtime mirror image around us. Does not apply on any other planets.
Re:Celestia (Score:5, Funny)
You said it! (Score:5, Funny)
There is something to be said about zipping to objects on the other side of the universe in just a few seconds. And it runs surprisingly well, even on my Late 2001 iBook (600MHz w/ 384MB of RAM and 8MB VRAM). This program is the ultimate for armchair (or bar-top as my case would be at the moment...gotta love wireless internet in Japan) astronomers. It does seem to have problems rendering Earth (as someone else mentioned the mirror effect somewhere in the comments of this story) but everything else is just amazing.
If you haven't downloaded this software yet, then the terrorists have already won...err...no, that isn't right. But seriously, get it and get it like now...as in yesterday! It is AWESOME.
BTW, on a side note, has anyone had any success compiling Celestia from source. I tried but failed (unfortunately, don't remember why). No particular reason to compile from source, but I wanted to try and see if it would be a bit more optimized. Anyway, I had difficulty. Anyone else?
Cheers. :)
Re:Desktop Cray? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:You said it! (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Desktop Cray? (Score:2, Funny)
hth,
mike overbo
Re:Hmmmm.... (Score:1, Funny)
Where have you been? (Score:3, Funny)
A bit out of date? (Score:5, Funny)
However, I'm I the only one who still sees Skylab orbiting the earth? Shouldn't it be in a geostationary orbit, approximately 0km above Australia?
cerebella...? (Score:4, Funny)
with the force of a crowbar to the Cerebellum?
You want the cerebral cortex. That's where the thinking happens. The cerebellum is a funny little bit in the old middle bit of your brain that keeps your balance working. Applying a crowbar to it would merely have a simmilar effect to many pints of beer...