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NOTICE: This version of the NSF Unidata web site (archive.unidata.ucar.edu) is no longer being updated.
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To learn about what's going on, see About the Archive Site.
S F Palu wrote:
Please ignore this kind of stupid question and criticism of VisAD from suchNEWBIE as M.Huang .
I don't think we should ignore criticsm. We were all newbies once and probably (at least I did) have the same criticism. Obviously, this is an insult to Bill and the VisAD
team.
I've said the same things before, but didn't intend to insult and I don't think maohai intends it that way either. m's pointing out valid deficiencies in the documentation. But all the Javadocs in the world don't substitute for a good tutorial. Ugo's done a fine job in his attempt. He did this to fill a void. If that doesn't fill the void, then someone should suggest changes or write a new one. Sun's Java tutorial is excellent at describing how to use the java classes, much better than a set of javadocs. That doesn't mean javadocs aren't needed for developers. But if I write a system on top of Java, I don't expect that users of that system will need to look at the javadocs for JTable to use my package.
If M.Huang cannot understand VisAD, then use JFreeChart or SGT. VisAD is for serious stuff (or at least scientific stuff) . Scientific computing is different from simple High School type plotting that is available in JFreeChart. If you do High School plot then VisAD is not for you. Try some commercial Java graphics APIs or any open source ones. VisAD is the best is there is for Java. I rate VisAD as the same par as MatLab graphics or in some functionalities it has more built-in graphics manipulation functions than MatLab. MatLab is almost the standard Tool of every University Engineering School, Industrial Research (eg, NASA), Physics and Maths Departments around the world. So if VisAD is equivalent to or almost superior than MatLab graphics, then this means that M. Huang, need to join the mail-group for JFreeChart or a newbie Java graphics mail-group and demand the functionalities that she/he needed to be implemented.
I agree that VisAD is a powerful library that is not intended for the weak of heart. ;-) And simpler interfaces could be constructed on top of VisAD, or perhaps one of the easier to use tools like JFreeChart or SGT can be used as the rendering engine for VisAD Data objects. While the Display model in VisAD requires you use the VisAD Data model, the Data model could be used with other Display packages. But someone would have to convert between VisAD Data objects and JFreeChart/SGT/... data models. Perhaps we should take Andrew Wilson's suggestion and get a list of the specific tasks needed to make VisAD a suitable candidate for the Herschel IA group. If no one wants to take on these tasks, then they are free to choose another software package or develop one themselves. But they need to weigh the trade-offs in personnel time between re-inventing the wheel or documenting an already built one. In the end, someone has to fund the development or do it on their spare time and contribute it back. I've got plenty of people telling me what the IDV needs to allow them to use it. It goes into a list and waits for funding or time to implement. Anyway, for now I have to sign off this discussion. Don ************************************************************* Don Murray UCAR Unidata Program dmurray@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx P.O. Box 3000 (303) 497-8628 Boulder, CO 80307 http://www.unidata.ucar.edu/staff/donm *************************************************************
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