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IBM Open-Sources 3D Data Visualization Software

Effugas writes " IBM has just released IBM Visualization Data Explorer under an Open Source license. Appears to be an impressively complex and powerful 3D data manipulation tool. If this is the same stuff I saw running back at LinuxWorld(realtime solid model deformation calculations of a crashing vehicle) I'm impressed. "

26 comments

  1. Anyone using DX to visulize 3D Terrain data??? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


    How were the Hilo/Tsunami examples performed? (wow) Is there a GIS module for DX??????

    Thanx!

  2. How does IDL compare to DX?????? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0


    2nd try, first time this got a threshold of -1.

    Why? This is completely on-topic non profane, non flame bait.....

  3. Check out #44 "Mmmm...Donuts" in particular by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "Mmmm...Donuts" -- very nicely done. The animation on the Donut really kicks ass.

  4. Because it doesn't sell? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe almost everybody uses AVS?
    What are the pros and cons of each?

  5. Thanks ivan!!! idl = Interactive Data Language by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0



    idl = Interactive Data Language

    a product of research system inc.

    a popular data visualization tool used by astronomers and other scientists:

    http://www.rsinc.com/idl/

  6. Re:Other packages... (Finite Element display) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Anyone lnow of any visualization/post processors for finite element data?

    I'm looking for something inexpensive, running on Linux/NT, that will take Shell/Frame element data: nodes, connectivity and nodal (tensor) stresses per element and give me the ability to do cool imaging. I'm looking for things like being able to plot principal stress, direction, and magnitude. I'd like to do this without too much coding, since if I had the time I'd write the stuff I need in MATLAB. Since I don't have the time, well, I'd like to have at least the heavy lifting part out of the way.

    For reference, I'm dealing with SAP2000 on NT right now as the FEA analysis tool. Numerically it's pretty good, but its visualization looks straight out ofthe 16 color era. One component at a time, basically inadequate for anything but the simplest operations.


    Mail me @ eric-slashdot@soroos.net if you've got recomendations

  7. Re:Data explorer Mpegs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm a big fan of the 1997 epic "Termigizer" myself.
    ;)

  8. Re:Everyone and their mothers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    here is the license:
    http://www.almaden.ibm.com/dx/DXDLLicense.html

  9. All the COOL!! software is on Linux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    I looked over the IBM website, and it looks like
    you can create your own custom, dynamically loadable modules into the data explorer.

    The OpenGL graphics client resides on a workstation and processing (SMP capable) may reside locally or on another machine.

    With an object oriented, visual construction language, ( unlike 'Visual' Basic or 'Visual' C++) and an awesome visualization toolkit, this is pretty much a developers wet dream.

    I work on a bank's trading floor, and this sort of client/server / graphical analysis package would cost a small fortune if it came from a boutique software shop. ( In fact we have spent millions - yes millions - on one of a kind, vendor proprietary graphics / data distribution software, and we are really LOCKED into the vendors whims of upgrades, and support)

    With open source toolkits like ACE, Qt, and the above, its simply amazing what one can do on the linux platform.

    With everything openSource, we can use one package with another, the sum much greater than the parts.


    Bravo Linux and open source!!

  10. This looks like khoros. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2

    This looks like khoros. Khoros lets you drag
    and connect little image processing boxes
    together to run experiments. Is this thing
    close? Compare and contrast. Extra points for
    source code examples (just kidding).

    And is anyone following the Khoros licencing?
    They used to be open source, but it seemed
    for a while they were going backward!

    -- cary

    Khoros is at http://www.khoral.com

  11. Other packages... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3

    While this DX is quite different ( and more powerful), people might be interested to know about other Open Source visualisation software :

    The General Mesh Viewer:

    www-xdiv.lanl.gov/XCM/gmv/GMVHome.htm l

    Maverik:

    aig.cs.man.ac.uk/systems/Maverik/


  12. Release on the 26th by Yarn · · Score: 0

    My birthday, cool!

    I hope I can find some nice physicsy uses for it, pity I've just finished this year's extended project.

    Need some *big* plans for next year I suppose.

    --
    -Yarn - Rio Karma: Excellent
  13. IBM releases "Open Source" yet again by palpatine · · Score: 1

    Shouldn't "Open Source" be in quotes when IBM is involved? First of all, notice how they tactically avoid the words "Open Source" in their press release, with phrases such as "open-source availability" and "open access to the source code."

    I haven't seen any source licence, but I'm already guessing that it will be too restrictive to deserve the Open Source certification branding. Then again, I'd love to be proven wrong.

  14. You have no idea how awesome this software is by jabbo · · Score: 5

    unless you have used it. I was working on trying to get around several of the (patented) techniques used in DX so as to build my own version of it... I guess I can finish writing that DX2Octave module that I was going to finish when I was at Cornell.

    This software is *very* impressive. The screen shots on www.almaden.ibm.com don't convey what's really cool about DX -- check out this page for a better idea of how DX makes really nasty visualization tasks simple.

    This rules as much as SGI releasing XFS, not to put too fine a point on it. (Although SGI appears not to be releasing LVM support for XFS -- d'oh.)

    Looks like I've got my activity for the rest of this week's afternoons (at least). Now I just need to send notes to everyone I tried to explain DX to saying "Just download it, it's Free now".

    --
    Remember that what's inside of you doesn't matter because nobody can see it.
  15. So where is the license? by kfogel · · Score: 3

    Until they show the actual license, there
    is no way to know if it really will be
    "Open Source". I searched all around the
    site for it, no sign.

    Remembering Apple,
    -Karl

    --
    http://www.red-bean.com/kfogel
  16. Yay! by Chris+Mikkelson · · Score: 1

    I hope this means no more license managers for that product!

    --
    -Chris
  17. License not released yet by Bruce+Perens · · Score: 3
    IBM has not yet released the license. Let's wait for them to release it.

    By the way, if you've been looking for me or my net sites, my darned DSL provider, "Dspeed", went out of business. It's just as well, considering how many outages I had. Covad now has to switch all of their dspeed.net customers elsewhere, and might take a week to get that done.

    Use bruce@va.debian.org until further notice.

    Thanks

    Bruce

  18. Re:Cute, but.... by Jess · · Score: 0

    You posted in the wrong area.

  19. Re:Everyone and their mothers by Col.+Klink+(retired) · · Score: 2

    This looks like an old license. The page is dated July 1998 and doesn't look remotely "open-sourced". It talks about it being a "trial version" and limited functionality. I dunno how they can limit the functionality and release source code, which their main site claims they will be doing. I suspect a NEW license will be available when the download is ready.

    --

    -- Don't Tase me, bro!

  20. Data explorer to Matlab by choo · · Score: 2

    I've written a Data Explorer to Matlab module.
    So you can call Matlab from Data Explorer.
    Take a look:
    http://www.people.corne ll.edu/pages/sc110/dx2mat/dx2mat.htm

  21. Data explorer Mpegs by choo · · Score: 2

    Oh, and check out some cool mpegs done in Data Explorer:
    http://www.tc .cornell.edu/Visualization/contrib/cs418-sp94/cs41 8.html


  22. Everyone and their mothers by redhog · · Score: 1

      Everyone and their mothers seems to be opensource licensing their products. That's good. So, soon we'l have our files on XFS and our data made visible with Data Explorer.
      The site seems to be a litle bit thin; there is no trace of the license under which it will be released. But OK, they say they will open the download in two days, and the license may be included in the source tar-ball...

    --
    --The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
    1. Re:Everyone and their mothers by redhog · · Score: 1

      That wasn't an open source license, from what I can see it's a free trial license...

      --
      --The knowledge that you are an idiot, is what distinguishes you from one.
  23. MODERATORS: take note by ivan_13013 · · Score: 1

    this post that I am replying to does not contain anything that would appear to merit scoring it at -1, and neither did his previous post which was nearly identical in content. Probably nobody will answer the post seriously, since it didn't even go so far as to define the acronyms or provide any useful information. Nonetheless, a 0 or 1 score would be more appropriate according to the moderator guidelines.

  24. License is there now by SEWilco · · Score: 1
    On the announced date, the license is now available on the download link. I am not a lawyer, but I see that it does require that the source code of a product be available. So alterations of the original will be available.

    There also is a clause about patent licenses. Some parts of the program are covered by patents, and the license allows use of the patented features in this program but revokes the license on source code for patented features which is removed from this program. So we can improve this program, but there are restrictions on using some of this code in other programs.

  25. IBM's Data Explorer feedback by trancemonkey · · Score: 1

    So I've had a little indirect exposure to Data Explorer. I've heard what users think about using it,
    and it's mostly been negative, on the order of
    "Please find us a better sci-vis package...pleasepleasepleaseplease!!!!!"

    I haven't personally used it, though, and users, are...well...
    users. ;-)