00 - Overview

The python notebook provided here are a way to generate "Uniview Modules". The motivation behind them is to speed up the process of creating new content quickly and without a lot of debugging time. Normally when you create a module you copy an existing module and then start working on changing it piece by piece.

Using the notebook approach, you can speed up that process very much. All you have to change would be a few lines in the python script (generally the last cell) to create another module with your new custom changes.

We strongly encourage our users (those with a bit of a scripting background) to try these and understand how they work.

The good thing about these is that once you have made your "python notebook" or use the one we have shipped in this series, a non-programmer can easily make their custom modules from them by getting a 15-minutes tutorial about how to use the generator step (normally by the last cell or last two cells in the python notebook).

Here's a list of module generator that are currently given in this series:

Eclipse

A sky mode eclipse module.

Gravitational Waves

A gravitational simulation of binary star system.

GravSim

A general simulation of particles flying around and getting affected by planets gravity.

Material

Different shading techniques: ambient occlusion, cubemap, multiple light phong model, cartoon shading, plastic, simple hemispheric lighting, stone, wood.

ObjectInteriors

Generates planet interior module.

Panoramas

Angular and Equirectangular panoramas.

Projected Image

Placing an image in the screen space of the dome pointing at a point in space.

ShadowCone

The shadow cast by the moon on the planet. Supplementary visualization from space for the eclipse.

SpiceKernels

A simple comet and satellite placing in space.

StartTrails

Generating the star trails modules.