It's the latter, on-the-fly during pan viewing, until you export them using the pan export command.

Hi Mike,

I've just tried out mmb's export to PTGui for the first time and I have a problem. On my Mac, if I try to open the project in Hugin (the free open source PTGui equivalent) it tells me that it can't find the images.

This appears to be because Hugin needs the filenames in the .pts file to be wrapped in quotes, i.e.

#-imgfile 1024 1024 "1N212522868EFF76CNP0666L0M1.png"

Assuming this doesn't break the PTGui version, could the quotes be added to the next version?

Cheers,

James

I will check it out and see if that works. If there are any other changes you think should be made to the generated project file, please let me know.

I've just posted 1.5.1 with your change, James, and also a slight adjustment to the FOV for Navcam. (Side story about that: I was carefully comparing a MMB-generated spherical pan of Victoria to the official JPL version, and I noticed mine was slightly messed up, hence the adjustment. Spherical MMB-generated Navcam pans should now be pretty close to the JPL versions, although they're still not quite perfect. There is some more complex camera model stuff going on that I suppose I am unlikely to figure out. And of course the official JPL pans don't suffer the brightness clipping that results from using the stretched JPG's. Still, pretty darn close... )

I tried out Hugin and the mmb.pts project seems to work with it; at least I was able to generate a basic pan. Thanks for putting me on to this, I was not aware of Hugin.

Cheers Mike, that was quick, what with us all gawping at Vicky I didn't expect it for a while.

The export pan function is really handy for making the 'North at the top' polars for route map plotting. Last time I filled in for Tesheiner, making those by hand was a pain. In fact I was close to writing my own utility to write pan project files from the tracking data.

James

Minor S1K bug, the slide shows produced are only able to display 3 numbers in the date. The images from sol 1000 onward are all labeled as sol 100.

I'll fix it as soon as I have some time. If that's the worst problem, I'd say that's pretty good news. Nice to see some post-S1K images finally!

MMB ran into some trouble when attempting to update from JPL.
I had no trouble viewing JPL image from that date using firefox so the problem must be with MMB. It looks like its dropping the type of image before the sol number.

One other thing I was wondering about, is it possible to set MMB to check JPL only once a day?

That's odd... when I go out to the marsrovers raw images page now, there are no Sol 1000 images posted. Since, IIRC, MMB gets the link for the image page to read from the main index page, I am guessing that it may have been wrong on the main index page, and they are now fixing it ... ? Do you see Sol 1000 images out there at the moment?

Thanks,
Mike

Okay, never mind... There does appear to be a little MMB bug there. FWIW, the JPL page is also a bit messed up... it's putting the Sol1000+ images way down just after Sol 100 on the main index page.

Thanks for pointing it out. I'll get a fix out this weekend.

Mike

Version 1.5.2 fixes two S1K bugs .

I'm still a bit amazed, a ) that I had S1K bugs, however small and easy to fix, and b ) that we've lived long enough to see them! Hooray for S1K!

I have trouble with the panorama viewer : the window opens but nothing appear, I have a grey area and nothing .
What happen?

Gray? Sounds like a Java 3D problem. Did it work before? What's changed? Check the ErrorLog.txt file when the problem appears.

I found this in the error.log



You have to know that Java have update his systeme and before, the panorama viewer run normally. It's after the Java update that it don't run correctly. So, I have re-install Java3D because the update had remove it.
What can I do? Uninstall and re-install Java3D?

I know there was an warning with the last version of Java 3D warning about future requirements connected to the
"Exception in thread "J3D-Renderer-1" java.lang.IllegalStateException: GL_VERSION" exception reported above.

An error has developed in my MidnightMarsBrowser1.5.2 program over the last few weeks. I let the problem go. I was busy with other things including changing graphics cards, and installing DirectX. Also an automatic Java update - jre1.5.0_09 I am alo afraid that I may have changed some Java setting in the control panel trying to "fix" the problem

The symptoms are much more definite.

Check for New Images, and Advanced Update Images. work perfectly.

Error reporting when I select view panorama, although no problems with slide show.

Error reporting when I select Stop Update, although I can exit MMB.

Both view panorama error reports and Stop Update error reports are the same.

ERROR REPORT LOG

Starting Midnight Mars Browser 1.5.2 error log at Tue Nov 28 11:10:21 EST 2006
java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: javax/media/j3d/Node
at midnightmarsbrowser.CommonMenuBar.actionPerformed(CommonMenuBar.java:422)
at javax.swing.AbstractButton.fireActionPerformed(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.AbstractButton$Handler.actionPerformed(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.DefaultButtonModel.fireActionPerformed(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.DefaultButtonModel.setPressed(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.AbstractButton.doClick(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.plaf.basic.BasicMenuItemUI.doClick(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.plaf.basic.BasicMenuItemUI$Handler.mouseReleased(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Component.processMouseEvent(Unknown Source)
at javax.swing.JComponent.processMouseEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Component.processEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Container.processEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Component.dispatchEventImpl(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.retargetMouseEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.processMouseEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.LightweightDispatcher.dispatchEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Container.dispatchEventImpl(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Window.dispatchEventImpl(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.Component.dispatchEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventQueue.dispatchEvent(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpOneEventForHierarchy(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEventsForHierarchy(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.pumpEvents(Unknown Source)
at java.awt.EventDispatchThread.run(Unknown Source)

My Java 3d is installed and up to date.
WIN XP OS
I may have changed some Java setting in the control panel?

Any suggestions would be appreciated.

Jack

This is a somewhat common problem, although I'm not sure what the exact cause is. Somehow your installation of Java 3D has been corrupted or removed. You should reinstall Java 3D. You might need to uninstall Java 3D, restart your machine, and then install it again. It's possible the Java update caused the problem, I suppose.

The JRE update installs the new version in a new folder and leaves the old one alone.
In my case :

C:\Program Files\Java\JRE1.5.0_06

became

C:\Program Files\Java\JRE1.5.0_09

The Java3D files were installed into the old _06 Folder, so the new JRE version couldn't find them anymore.
Reinstalling Java3D put the needed files in the right folder (_09) and my problems were gone.

Ah. That would probably explain it, then. Thanks, OWW.

Zippity Do Dah

I am back exploring the surface of Mars. I have just made
a careful 360 degree scan of the alien terrain from the safety
of my trusty Semi-Autonomous Mars Roving Vehicle.

I also turned off the automatic programing updates for my
coffee machine. I can live with my Java being a bit out
of date.

I was going to thank both of you for your help,
but it would be more precise to thank you for a totally
accurate solution.

Jack

A have an odd problem with the panoramas generated by MMB. It looks like the number of bits per pixel is being reduced, this spoils the color images of the inside of Victoria for example. I didn't notice it until after the latest updates. Anyone else been having this problem?
Click to view attachment

My dad had some Java once that was definately out of date. Took a mug of iced coffee up to our storage "barn" and forgot it. A week or so later, there were several 1/4 inch fuzzy green spots floating on the Java. Most assuredly out of date!

(The technical term is: "Eew!")

I haven't noticed it. You'd get similar results if you had your display settings set to a lower color depth. Or maybe I messed something up... would be good to know if anyone else has experienced the problem.

For regular users: I have just updated a bunch of the brightness metadata for the pans around Victoria; so when you see a bunch of images getting regenerated, that is why.

I tried viewing the panorama with an older version of MMB. The problem is still there, its really noticeable in the sky images. The problem doesn't seem to be the monitor settings since individual images look fine. I guess the problem must have started with the last update of Java.

Hi,

Can you tell me a little about the upcoming version of MMB? What kind of features and tweaking are you working on and do you have a release date planned?
Peronally I would be very much interested in a manual viewer or explorer like interface for the pictures, and I noticed on Marscat you are working on this...

Michiel

The screenshots show a new version of MMB I am experimenting with, using the Eclipse rich client framework. The goal is to recreate the functionality that exists in MMB now, but with a better user interface. It's not a sure thing that I'll ever finish this or release it, but if I do, I'll probably call it version 2.0. A nice target for releasing something would be Feb. 10, 2007, which will be MMB's second anniversary. We'll see if I make it - remember this is done in my spare time, so there are no promises.

P.S. One of the new features that is definitely in the cards is MMB workspaces, which I think someone (Emily?) suggested a way back.

That would be awesome, Mike. If you can get to it. I appreciate how much hard work goes in to this labor of love of yours. Even if you never made another impovement you'd have my undying gratitude. It's a bad habit of us UMSFers to thank you for a great piece of software by demanding further improvements!

--Emily

P.S. Perhaps you could figure out a way to clone yourself and make the clone develop the Midnight Saturn Browser?

Thanks, Emily. It's kind of an educational project for me (learning about Eclipse), although I won't deny that mainly I want a better toy to play with myself ;-)

Workspaces are easy. Rewriting the Panorama stuff in JOGL (Java OpenGL) from Java 3D... that I'm not sure I'm looking foward to. (Eclipse doesn't support Java 3D, or vice versa. The changeover to OpenGL may ultimately be a good thing, but it's going to be a bit of work.)

Midnight Saturn Browser... I wish I had that kind of time. :-)

Sounds excellent Mike. I enjoy MMB very much, especially the colour photo generating feature!
Hope no too many new planets are discovered and explored for you!

Well, you have a few years to develop the Midnight Pluto and Kuiper Belt Object Browser.

Or MEB for Midnight Earth Browser

Sorry, I'm far far away


NB : seriously, I think it will be a very good thing to develop MMB for Saturn

Well, seriously, it's an open-source project... maybe somebody else can take the 'Midnight Saturn' idea and run with it. BTW, one of the selling points of Eclipse is that it's extensible. One of the things I'm trying to do with 2.0 is clean up the code so that the concepts could be applied to other projects... not that I have time to do that myself.

I think I've linked to this before, but I came across it again so I'll link to it again. It's a book forward by Jeff Norris, a supervisor in the JPL software group, discussing their use of the Eclipse Rich Client Platform in Maestro and subsequent software. I find it fascinating; it may be interesting even to non-software types. Eclipse RCP is what I'm trying to use in my little MMB 2.0 project.

Would you also be able to add an Always on top feature to the MMB viewer? Would be neat!


Thanks.


Michiel

If there was a way to nail a a quote to this topic, that would be the one. Even if we had to return to version 1, I'd still be grateful. Who wants to go back to the "old way?"

I just updated to Mac OS 10.4(.8) and now I am having the same or similar problem. So I guess I'll have to figure out what's going on now.

Cross-posted from the blog in case anyone wonders what's going on:

Apologies for hassling you with my MMB problem. It's just that i'm very eager to try the 'View Panorama' option
but every time I press the button a popupwindow with errors appears.

The first listed error is;
java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError:javax/media/j3d/Node (Unsupported major.minor version 49.0)

I tried with both java3D 1.5.0 and 1.3.1, any idea what could be wrong? Thanks for your time.
(btw, i'm running winXP but that shouldn't matter for Java... right?)

Actually the platform can matter quite a bit. In this case, UnsupportedClassVersionError might happen if you are running an older version of Java. Please check what version of Java you have. You need at least Java 1.4 for MMB. Java 3D 1.5 requires Java 1.5, and Java 3D 1.3.2 requires Java 1.4.2. I don't see Java 3D 1.3.1 available for download anymore, so you may want to at least go up to Java 3D 1.3.2.

Suddenly - without warning - and without knowingly changing anything on my machine.

Poo.

PS - anyone tried MMB on a Macbook? How does the pan viewing go without a dedicated graphics chip?

Doug

That's the standard Java3D-not-found error. If you haven't changed anything, probably your Java 3D installation became corrupted somehow - it seems to happen now and then for some reason. Reinstall Java 3D.

Thanks guys, you are really re-motivating me to finish the next version and get rid of the Java 3D requirement once and for all.

YAY! It works! Seems it was an unfortunate mixup of version numbers... java3D 1.4.01 runs okay.
Thank you for the fast reply and MMB in general !

Bingo

Doug

Panning is smooth, zooming is jerky. I suspect java3D
BTW, it ran out of the box, no additional installs required.

Some of the jerkiness might be my poor keyboard handling code rather than Java3D. Try holding the control key (I think) and moving the mouse forward and back to zoom.

Seems you're right here. Zooming with the mouse is smooth as well, so MMB runs fine on a Macbook.
But since i'm a noob with the program i cant say that i've tested it to its full capacity.

See -the jump from £800-900 for a MB to £1500 for a MBP is now harder to swallow - struggling to see much benefit at all really. Damn you Steve Jobs - where's Keynote 4

Doug

By coincidence, my wife just got one, and I tried out MMB briefly. It seems to work well, except that Mac OS 10.4 has this problem where Java 3D is using 16-bit color instead of 32-bit color, which looks dreadful. In other words, the panoramas move very smoothly but look like crap. Unfortunately there is no fix for this and no ETA for a fix for this. I'm motivated to fix it because I use a Mac myself, but it's a time and priorities issue.

For the adventurous: MMB2.0 development releases. Read all the notices before downloading.