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Virtual Hiker is a Java program that allows a user to easily and
interactively use map data to plan hikes or explore new areas (currently
only in the United States). This program includes features helpful
to the hiker such as interactive 3D maps of the terrain rendered in
real-time; the ability to trace trails across the terrain and get height
verses distance profiles; and the ability to tile together adjacent maps
to create large seamless map areas.
Virtual Hiker comes in two parts: Virtual Hiker itself and
VH Editor. Virtual Hiker is an end-user program that is designed
to easily read maps that have been processed and organized into a coherent
database. Virtual Hiker is easy to use, has a simple user interface,
and could be shipped with a CD-ROM containing an associated map database.
VH Editor, on the other hand, is a bit more complex, but is also more
flexible. VH Editor is primarily used to read raw USGS map data and
convert it to a form that is easier to work with in Virtual Hiker.
VH Editor also includes a small amount of map editing and analysis features
(very small, but growing). VH Editor can do everything Virtual Hiker
can, but adds additional features that may not be of use to some users.
Warning: Virtual Hiker and VH Editor are pre-Beta
and many features are incomplete or unreliable. So proceed with
caution.
The primary features of Virtual Hiker and VH Editor:
- VH Editor can read most types of U.S. Geological
Survey (USGS) map data that is on a 24k Universal Transverse Mercator
(UTM) grid. This includes Digital Raster Graphic (DRG) images including
Digital Orthographic Quads (DOQ), Digital Elevation Maps (DEM) in either
ASCII or SDTS format, and Digital Line Graphs (DLG) in either ASCII
or SDTS format.
- You can load as many map layers as you want (until
you run out of memory) and they can be tiled together to form large
seamless maps.
- When multiple map layers are either overlaid or
tiled together, they can be saved to a single Virtual Hiker specific
file that groups all the map layers together.
- The user can select any location on the map and
get latitude, longitude, altitude (if a DEM map layer is loaded), and
magnetic offset from true north for that point.
- A line can be traced across a map (that includes
a DEM layer) and a plot of height verses distance will be generated
as well as some other statistics calculated.
- DRG images (which are often very large) can be
processed to create a tiled image that can be loaded and displayed and
zoomed in and out of efficiently while using very little memory.
- An interactive, 3D map, rendered in real-time
can be generated for any number of tiled DEM map layers (they do NOT
have to be joined together into a single large DEM first!). The
terrain rendering algorithm renders in real-time even for large data
sets (I've tested it with up to nine 30m resolution DEMs loaded at a time
-- about 1.3 million grid points -- on a 350 MHz Macintosh G3). Any
image can be texture mapped onto the 3D terrain and a feature is provided
that will convert any DRG into an appropriate texture map. This allows
you to use standard topographic maps as textures as well as properly map
aligned satellite photos and map aligned orthographic aerial photographs
(such as DOQs).
- DLG map elements can be picked by the user and queried
against a database. Currently this feature is a "proof-of-concept"
implementation only, but could be extended to be a powerful feature.
Imagine the user clicking on a trail map element and getting information
on the trail; it's name, length, difficulty, description, etc.
Virtual Hiker, and VH Editor, currently use GL4Java to access OpenGL for
3D graphics rendering from Java. GL4Java is currently available for
Java 1.4 on Windows and Linux and Java 1.3 on MacOS X. If you are running
on any other platform, the 3D graphics portion of this program are
not going to work. I would very much like to port the 3D graphics
over to use JOGL instead
of GL4Java to access OpenGL, but have not had time myself. If you
are interested in trying to do this, please contact
me!
VH Editor also uses a native library to read SDTS format binary
files from the USGS. This library is accessed via the Java Native
Interface (JNI). Currently, I have this native library compiled
for MacOS X and Linux-i386 only. If someone could compile this JNI
library for me on other platforms that would be greatly appreciated!
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Installation Instructions:
MacOS X:
You should have received this application as a compressed disk image file
(VHEditor_#.#.#_MacOSX.dmg). This disk image file, when mounted (by
double-clicking on it), should contain the application icon (VH Editor.app),
this readme file (README_VHEditor.txt) and some legal documents explaining
the GPL.
To install this program, simply drag the VH Editor.app icon to a convenient
location on your hard drive. In MacOS X this is usually the "Applications"
directory, but you are free to put it anywhere you want (aren't Macs great!).
The application file should work properly on MacOS X 10.2 or later right
out of the box. No additional software required.
Windows:
You will first have to make sure that you have the J2SE 1.3 or later installed
on your computer. If you do not, you can get it from: http://java.sun.com
You should have received this application as a executable installer
file (VHEditor_#.#.#_Windows_installer.exe). Run this installer.
It will make sure that everything gets put where it belongs. If you
have a previous version of this program installed, you need to "uninstall"
the old version first. You can find the uninstaller program in the
same directory that you originally installed the program into or you can use
"Start-Settings-Control Panels-Add/Remove Programs.
Linux (and many flavors of UNIX):
You will first have to make sure that you have the J2SE 1.3 or later installed
on your computer and on your search path. If you do not, you can get
it from: http://java.sun.com
You should have received this application as a executable shell script
installer file (VHEditor_#.#.#_Linux_installer.bin). After you have
downloaded the installer, you will need to make it executable by changing
it's permissions:
chmod a+x VHEditor_*_Linux_installer.bin
If you have a previous version of this program installed, you need to
"uninstall" the old version first. You can find the uninstaller program
in the same directory that you originally installed the program into.
If you want to install Virtual Hiker into your account only, simply run
the installer script. It will make sure that everything gets put where
it belongs. If you want to install this program outside of your account,
you can use the su utility to get super-user access:
su ./VHEditor_*_Linux_installer.bin
If running under Linux on an x86 platform, you should be able to use the
3D terrain rendering feature. This feature uses the GL4Java library. I do not
have the GL4Java library compiled for other platforms, and so the 3D graphics
feature will not be available on those. However, if you can get GL4Java to
compile on your platform, then it can be made to work with Virtual Hiker.
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