[An xplanet image, using peters projection]

THIS PROJECT HAS ENDED. IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN CONTINUING IT, FEEL FREE TO TALK TO ME.

This page is the home of some scripts that deal with geographic information (GIS), especially related to the xplanet program (Version 0.9x only, for now). They allow you to display up-to-the-minute information on weather, earthquakes, hurricanes and more on your computer. You can see how the results look like on FlatPlanet which uses all the below scripts.

Stable versions at
http://hans.ecke.ws/xplanet
Development versions at
http://acoustics.mines.edu/~hans/hans/xplanet


All-in-one packages that should be unpacked into your xplanet directory (the directory with the images/ and markers/ subdirectories).

Windows users please read this.

Announcements archive | Mailing list.

Program Version Updated Usage
geo_locator 2.1.5 02 May 2003 determine geographic locations
weather 4.1.8 15 Jul 2003 display weather icons and temperatures on xplanet maps
forecast 1.2.5 17 Jul 2003 display the weather forecast for your location on an xplanet map
earthq 2.1.7 15 Jul 2003 display earthquake locations and magnitudes on xplanet maps
volcano 2.1.5 05 May 2003 display active volcanos on xplanet maps
hurricane 2.2.3 15 Jul 2003 display current hurricanes / storms on xplanet maps, with magnification
visible-satellites 0.8.2 05 May 2003 display satellites visible from your home
xplanet-update 0.9.7 15 Jul 2003 update your xplanet marker files, satellite info and cloud images
image-stream 0.9.7 15 Jul 2003 continuous background process, creates a stream of current xplanet images
moonphase 0.8.1 02 May 2003 show the phases of the moon
xplanet Linux RPM 0.94-3 02 May 2003 Linux RPM's of xplanet with various problems fixed
Windows binary 0.94-2 21 Feb 2003 Windows binary of xplanet with various problems fixed


All scripts have been converted to a unified configuration scheme. You don't have to edit scripts (those .pl files) anymore. Instead you only adjust the xplanet.conf configuration file:

Additionally, all source code published here is now under the GNU General Public License.


geo_locator and igeo

geo_locator.pl is a perl script that determines the coordinates of locations around the world or finds locations near specific coordinates. Developed together with Felix Andrews. Formerly known as xplanet-location.pl.

igeo.pl is an interactive version. It runs as a shell (using readline) and you can type your requests interactively, load different data sources or change the configuration.

geo_locator.pl is mostly a drop-in replacement for the tzcoord.pl that comes with xplanet, but is much more powerful. The differences are:
  • it knows a lot more locations, especially from the Getty Thesaurus
  • can perform inexact searches
  • can perform reverse lookup
It gets its information from
Last updated 02 May 2003, Version 2.1.5: more robust; more code cleanup

Downloadable files:

There are associated marker files which contain more than 100000 locations.


weather

This is a perl script which downloads weather information from weather.yahoo.com and weather undergound and writes a marker file which places those icons on the map. You'll need to set one or two environment variables so it knows where to look, but its very cool! Contributed by Joao Pedro Goncalves, and updated by me.

Please install the above geo_locator package before trying to install weather.pl.

Last updated 02 May 2003, Version 2.1.5: Updated wunderground.com parsing

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

[partial screenshot]

Europe at dusk: it's sunny and slightly hazy with 14-26 degrees celsius (centigrade) in Berlin and mostly clear with 11-19 degree celsius in Moscow.


forecast

This is a perl script which gathers the current weather forecast for your location (home town) from www.weather.com (example: Golden, CO, USA or Berlin, Germany ) and writes a marker file which displays this forecast on your xplanet maps.

Please note that this script may create a markerfile with absolute positions ("position=pixel") of more than 360. This is of course valid - your screen is likely wider than 360 pixels - but the stock xplanet 0.94 chokes on this. If you encounter problems, you have two possibilities:

  1. If you are running Linux, download the RPM file I provide below.
  2. If you are running Windows, download the xplanet distribution for Windows below.

Last updated 17 July 2003, Version 1.2.5: 'title not found' bug fixed

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

[partial screenshot]

Till Friday it will be cold and snowy, but will get drier and slightly warmer after Saturday.


earthq

This perl script downloads information about the most recent earthquakes and bigger earthquakes of the last month and writes them into a xplanet-style marker file, to be displayed on your maps. The idea and a reference implementation came from Michael Dear, integrated, updated and rewritten to Perl5 by me.

Last updated 15 July 2003, Version 2.1.7: filter out more errors in source data

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

If anybody out there has an artistic streak, I'd be really happy about nicer icons. I know I'm a crappy artist...
[partial screenshot]

In south- and east Europe, we see 4 recent earthquakes: one of magnitude 4.4 near the Black Sea, on of magnitude 4.6 off the coast of Greece and two near Sicily of magnitude 4.5 and 5.9. The 5.9 earthquake happened on September 5th.


volcano

This perl script downloads information about currently active volcanoes and writes them into a xplanet-style marker file, to be displayed on your maps.

Last updated 05 May 2003, Version 2.1.5: parsing improvements

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

  • volcano.pl Copy into your xplanet directory
  • volcano.exe Precompiled Windows executable
  • volcano_images.tar.gz Some icons to denote volcanoes. By default we use volcano.png. If you don't like it, copy one of the others over it. Unpack in your xplanet directory (the icons should go into xplanet/images/)
  • volcano_images.zip The same archive in ZIP format for Windows
[partial screenshot]

Popocatepetl near Mexico City is active...


hurricane

This perl script downloads information about tropical hurricanes and writes them into a xplanet-style marker file, to be displayed on your maps. It can also generate a close-up inset of the area around the center of a storm close to you.

Last updated 15 July 2003, Version 2.2.3: fix in inset name calculation - faster

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

  • hurricane.pl Copy into your xplanet directory
  • hurricane.exe Precompiled Windows executable
  • hurricane_data.tar.gz Data files for that version. Unpack in your xplanet directory. About 3 MB.
  • hurricane_data.zip The same archive in ZIP format for Windows
  • hurricane_images.tar.gz 3 different iconsets. Each set comes with versions for the major hurricane types. By default we use the third set. If you don't like it, copy one of the others over it. Unpack in your xplanet directory (the icons should go into xplanet/images/)
  • hurricane_images.zip The same archive in ZIP format for Windows
[partial screenshot]

Off the eastern coast of the US, we see tropical storm Gustav speeding ahead with 46mph and tropical depression 07 going with 29mph. Green tracks show the actual, past, path of the hurricane, while blue tracks show its forecast positions.

[partial screenshot]

An inset example: hurricane Lili shortly before crossing the western tip of Cuba. It is progressing to the North-West with 92 miles per hour.


visible-satellites

This perl script downloads information about satellites that will be visible to you during the night from Heavens-Above.com. The satellites will be displayed at all times, even when they are not visible. However, you can view how the trail of the satellites slowly moves towards your location, till at the prescribed time, it is above you.

Last updated 05 May 2003, Version 0.8.2: more robust; code cleanup

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

[partial screenshot]

Off the south-eastern coast of Australia, satellites TRMM and STS-107 speed eastwards. At 5:47pm and 7:22pm we will be able to see TRMM from our home. At 5:33pm and 7:6pm, STS-107 will be visible to us.


xplanet-update

This script is meant to be run every 3 hours. It will

This script is a direct successor of the xplanet.clouds.sh part of the discontinued xplanet-hans package. But unlike xplanet.clouds.sh it

Last updated 15 July 2003, Version 0.9.7: Unix: overriding DISPLAY with GEOMETRY on top of script

Downloadable files:


image-stream

This script is run continuously in the background. For a number of viewpoints (i.e. underneath the sun, on the morning terminator, above your home town) and projections (all projections xplanet can display) it continuously creates new xplanet images, using marker files created by any of the scripts above. Everything is of course configurable.

This script is a direct successor of the xplanet.draw.sh part of the discontinued xplanet-hans package. But unlike xplanet.draw.sh it

Please install the above geo_locator package before trying to install image-stream. If you update image-stream, please also update geo_locator.

Last updated 15 July 2003, Version 0.9.7: Unix: overriding DISPLAY with GEOMETRY on top of script

Downloadable files: Current screenshots, out of the stream of images produced (big: 200kB - 300kB each!):


moonphase

Using moonphase, your xplanet desktop shows the moon at its current position in its current phase. It also shows the dates when we have the next new moon, half moon and full moon.

Last updated 02 May 2003, Version 0.8.1: new moonicons

Downloadable files: (Usage, documentation and ChangeLog inside the script file at the top)

[partial screenshot]

Today, on the 13th of February, the phase is between half- and full moon, increasing towards the full moon which will appear on the 17th. The next (decreasing) half moon will be on the 23rd.


xplanet Linux RPM

xplanet-0.94-3.i386.rpm: a binary xplanet package compiled under RedHat Linux 9.0 with freetype2 installed. Problems fixed:

xplanet-0.94-3.src.rpm: The source RPM to this package, containing the patches.
xplanet-0.94-3_8.0.i386.rpm: The binary RPM, compiled under RedHat Linux 8.0.


Windows information and fixed binary xplanet distribution


Please write with any suggestions to Hans