Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

The Virtual Planet Explorer

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the don't-get-lost-in-there dept.

Roland Piquepaille writes "A European Union program has helped several European partners to develop the Virtual Planet (or V-Planet) software, which will enable its users to browse and interact in three dimensions with any part of our planet, according to IST Results. "Using Vplanet Explorer, anyone can set off on a journey to discover new regions in 3D, rather than staring at a flat map and trying to picture its scenery," says Eric Martin, coordinator of the IST project. The software can also be used for technical simulations and has already been used by both Airbus and Boeing. It should be available this summer for about 10,000 euros (about $12K). Besides other details and references, this overview contains several pictures of simulations using V-Planet."

8 of 110 comments (clear)

  1. Image gallery by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative


    instead of visiting Rolands link farm (with his copy n pasted content)
    try the real gallery he cribbed his images from

    http://www.crs4.it/vic/images/

  2. Worldy Wisdom by Doc+Ruby · · Score: 3, Informative

    Why don't they just add models, and maybe an upgrade, to the FOSS Celestia? It's already got a fanatical userbase, very detailed engine, and lots of models. If the EU is going to spend the people's money on software, the people should get the source code they bought.

    --

    --
    make install -not war

  3. EU Funding... by SiGiN · · Score: 2, Informative

    Living in finland.. I have strange feeling, that EU funds every silly thing it cames across.

    For example - EU decided that every building should be repaired in our city by some year (can't remember now)

    And so buildings were repaired.. Very very fast. Quality of such repairs, are however - totally another story. Should I say - "Same shit, nicer cover"?

    As about this V-Planet thingie.. Its cool. However I am somehow more fascinated at Google Maps.

    Oh. And actual URL to V-Planet is here

    --
    Dephine URL
  4. How does this compare .... by swimin · · Score: 2, Informative

    How does this compare to NASA's World Wind?

    1. Re:How does this compare .... by fourtyfive · · Score: 2, Informative

      Well, NASA's World Wind does about the same thing, with a bit less High res EU imagery, has a great userbase, awesome devs, is free, and open source. And a lot more extensible. Overall its the best program on the planet (Of course, I'm a dev, so I might be a bit biased :P)

  5. OSS version already under development by pixelphsr · · Score: 2, Informative
    The OSSIM http://www.ossim.org/ project already has a working version of this, called osgPlanet. It was demonstrated at the Open Source GIS conference last week. http://mapserver.gis.umn.edu/mum/mtg2005.html

    OsgPlanet can stream imagery from any MapServer using WMS protocol. (Check JPL's wms server for one http://wms.jpl.nasa.gov/) It builds a 3D model of the world on the fly using SRTM terrain data that you can download from the USGS for most of the globe.

    The difference between this and something like Google maps is that osgPlanet and Vplanet let you actually fly around in the terrain, instead of just looking down at it.

  6. What's a voxel? by SassyDave · · Score: 2, Informative

    If you're wondering what a voxel is, webopedia has a pretty good definition.

    Basically, it's a "volume pixel", which apparently is a box with height, width, and depth, and it has to do with how fine images appear. The more voxels in the image, the smoother it'll appear. So a pixel is to a 2D image what a voxel is to a 3D image. Wikipedia .

  7. Roland the Plogger blows it again by Animats · · Score: 3, Informative
    Another Roland the Plogger story, trying to get traffic for his blog.

    The real link to the project is here.. Roland the Plogger makes you go through two extra levels of blogs to get there. (Does he get traffic kickbacks, or what?) The project ran from 2001 to 2004; it's done.

    And Keyhole does the same thing. For $29.95, not €12,000.