21 January, 2008:
New: "Varkon Extended Library" demo modules
available in Examples
David Keyes has submitted some modules
that extend Varkon's capabilities.
Great job, and Muchas Gracias, David!
There are modules that expand the
dimensioning system to include imperial
units, among other things; there's a module
which allows the cloning of entities, and
there are some miscellaneous math and string
functions. The code is licensed under the
GPL.
There is also an html manual page for each
function or module.
See them on the Examples page.
14 January, 2008:
Varkon.Org: Minor site updates for now, more
coming soon.
The Varkon.Org site has gotten a bit out
of date lately, so I've made some minor updates
to freshen things up a bit while I work on the
scripts that generate most of the pages here.
I've updated the MBS source files page to
reflect the latest released version, and
tweaked the notes that no longer apply to the
latest release. Bear with me while I bash my
scripts into shape. Remember: If you don't see
what you want, ask for it.
29 August, 2007:
The Lofting Floor Is Closing: SourceForge
Will Host Varkon Forum
Due to the rapid development of the
SourceForge site, I've decided to close the
Lofting Floor forum on Varkon.Org. This will
consolidate Varkon's official site on
SourceForge. The Berlios mailing list will
follow suit at some point. Anyone who wants
their material reposted on the new forum is
welcome to contact me at the Varkon.Org email
address, or through the Official Varkon Site.
28 May, 2007:
The Lofting Floor: A new forum on Varkon.Org
The Lofting Floor is a place where the
Varkon CAD developers can get together to work
on various parts of the Varkon system. The name
reflects the nautical history of some of the
techniques used in CAD and modeling.
Only registered users may post to this forum.
Go there via the "Forum" link.
27 April, 2007: The Nickajack Glide Boat
Project
The Nickajack Glideboat represents John
Hughes's efforts to develop a light, stable,
fast watercraft which can be portaged.
It's shape is based on the traditional
Adirondack Guide Boat, a transportable
canoe-like boat developed in New York state's
Adirondack Mountains in the mid-1800s.
Mr. Hughes has supplied the code for this
project, and you can get it on the Examples
page.
Photos and links to the Nickajack Guide Boat
Project site are on the Projects page.
6 January, 2007: Show and Tell on the
Varkon.Org Projects Page
Have you got a nifty project involving
Varkon? Tell us and we'll show it off and link
to it. This site is for you!
22 November, 2006: The Cow Demo Is Here!
Remember the mysterious "Cow" demo? It's
listed on the Orebro site, but you can't get it
there.
Well, thanks to Dan Falck, you can get it
here.
The Cow (Creating Object Window) Demo is a
menu generator used when creating Varkon
applications. You can make buttons, icons,
and text-input windows, and paste the code
into your applications.
See it on the Examples page.
9 November, 2006: Varkon.Org Folding@Home
Team Started
Not drawing? Try folding.
Folding@Home, a project at Stanford
University, can use your excess CPU cycles to
perform the enormous numbers of calculations
necessary to understand protein folding and
related subjects.
This work may help scientists to cure
diseases related to defects caused by
mis-folded proteins, etc. It's important
work, and you can help. More...
16 October, 2006: New Examples Posted
I got some nice examples from Johan
Kjellander and Gunnar Liden:
- Dr. Kjellander sent me a boat hull design
demo, and
- Mr. Liden sent a conceptual aircraft
design demo and a module that aligns text to
an arbitrarily curved line.
See them on the Examples page.
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24 March, 2008:
Varkon 1.19C Released!
Varkon 1.19C is now released on the
SourceForge web site:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/varkon
1.19C is available as a source code package
for Linux, MacOSX and FreeBSD. There is also
a prebuilt binary for Linux.
Both distributions include the full
documentation which is also available through
the Varkon web site:
http://varkon.sourceforge.net/
Please read the releasenotes before updating.
Changes have been made that may require your
attention.
http://varkon.sourceforge.net/man_1.19C/relnotes/index.htm
11 February, 2008:
Varkon Gets TIFF Output For OpenGL Window
Varkon 1.19C will include a new (beta
version) TIFF output. The new TIFF creator
takes the current contents of an OpenGL window
and writes it as a gray scale 300 DPI TIFF
image of the same size as the window to a file
on disc.
The TIFF generator was contributed by Armin
Faltl from his standalone Varkon GUI project.
Thanks Armin!
If you want to try this new feature, download
svn#87 or later from the SVN repository on
the SourceForge site.
15 January, 2008:
Varkon 1.19C Release Coming Soon
According to the Varkon developers, version
1.19C should be released in about 2-4 weeks:
"The major developments compared to 1.19B
are:
- System moved to SourceForge and sources
under svn control.
- Many GUI enhancements and fixes.
Scrollbars, file selector etc.
- 2D and 3D merged (2D removed).
- PID files removed.
- Explicit/generic mode from new (optional)
start window.
- Context sensitive help system updated.
- Tutorial added to docs.
- Updated Interactive systems manual.
- Updated MBS programmers manual.
- New Application developers manual.
- New System administrators manual.
and finally something that is particularly
fun I think,
- Support (makefiles) for the Macintosh OSX
platform (We have tested OK on two different
machines)."
You'll discover that the 1.19C release
is a real advance over earlier versions.
Dr. Kjellander personally revised over 1,000
pages of documentation, a confrontation with
drudgery that should be considered a health
hazard. He and the other developers have also
made extensive code updates and rewrites.
The Varkon team has put forth an amazing
effort and it really shows.
22 November, 2007:
Varkon 1.19B Going Full Steam Ahead
Improvements on the 1.19B version have
been making rapid progress. If you haven't
tried it out you're missing a lot. The 1.19B.33
patch version from source is the best for
getting work done right now, with later
versions being more unstable as new things are
constantly being added.
Varkon GUI Demo Update
Latest update 16 November, 2007
Armin Faltl has updated his graphical user
interface for Varkon. The newest release is on
the GUI page. Try it out.
29 August, 2007:
Varkon Now On SourceForge, Version 1.19B
Released!
The Varkon team has moved it's official
downloads and website to SourceForge. The
mailing list and forum will follow at some
point.
You'll now have all the benefits of
SourceForge's resources to make Varkon's
development and use as efficient and
effective as possible. There are trackers for
bugs and feature requests, so you can keep an
eye on Varkon's progress, and a graphical
interface to the Subversion repository so you
can see what the latest version is. You can
also pull source directly from the repository
to get the latest fixes.
There has been lots of progress on the newest
version, with some significant bug fixes.
The new version is coming along nicely, but
we need people to test it and file bug
reports and feature requests, so pop in and
download the latest release, or roll your own
from SVN.
The New Official Varkon
Site.
24 May, 2007:
Call for Icon designs for Varkon 1.19
The Varkon developers are designing new
icons for Varkon 1.19. Dr. Kjellander has
provided some initial designs which are now on
the Icons page. Interested parties are welcome
to submit their designs too.
2 May, 2007:
Orebro University uses Varkon in Experimental
Reverse-Engineering system
"Reverse engineering". Some people might
think it's only a technique used to "steal" a
competitor's ideas, but it has lots of useful
positive applications too.
Reverse engineering might be useful when
either a CAD model does not exist at all, or
when you think there might be discrepancies
between your CAD data and the actual article.
You might use R.E. to generate a CAD model to
recreate or repair old products, or things
for which you have no CAD model (body parts,
topographical models in GIS and games,
products produced by another manufacturer,
etc. -and need we mention boat hulls-). The
reverse engineered CAD model may be used for
visualization, simulation or to produce a
copy of the object.
At Orebro University in Sweden, they're
developing a system to automate the
measurement process using a robotic arm to
control a laser scanner, and Varkon to
control the scanning process and to gather
the data. Here are some links to their
project:
Experimental Laser Scanner Setup for GMAC
Geometric Modeling based on automated Data
Capture (GMAC)
Reverse Engineering
5 April, 2007:
Varkon 1.19A Making Steady Progress Towards
Mid 2007 Release Date.
Dr. Johan Kjellander, Varkon's creator,
announced today that the 1.19A release is
progressing according to plan and provides a
link to the Release Notes page, which states in
part:
"Varkon 1.19A is under development and is
planned to be released mid 2007. Varkon 1.19
will include support for trimmed surfaces and
we also hope to have taken several steps
further in the direction of a new user
interface with new functionality and new
"feel and look".
Support for trimmed surfaces is implemented
by extending the current representation of a
surface with the possibility to add
trimcurves. Trimcurves are either
cubic/rational or NURBS curves in the
UV-plane of the surface. A new MBS routine
CUR_COMP_ARR can be used to create
trimcurves. A new MBS routine SUR_TRIM_USRDEF
can be used to create a surface with
trimcurves.
The new user interface is based on new
dialogue windows and two types of graphical
windows, WPGWIN and WPRWIN. The WPGWIN window
is similar to the old default window but with
new functionality. The WPRWIN window uses
OpenGL for dynamic zoom, rotation, pan etc.
..."
http://www.tech.oru.se/cad/varkon/rel/rn_1.19A.htm
4 January, 2007:
Varkon 1.18B Source Now Available; 1.19A Soon
Looks like Varkon development is heating
up for a change, with the release of Varkon
1.18B now, and 1.19A sometime later this year.
Varkon 1.18B is a prerelease of the next
major version. It's only being released as
sourcecode, and only for Unix and Linux.
Varkon 1.18B includes new functionality and
bug fixes, and a major rewrite of large
portions of the sourcecode in preparation for
the new graphical user interface that's being
hosted on the GUI page.
Get more info and keep track of the latest
doings on the official Varkon Release Notes
page.
Download the code from the official Varkon Downloads
Page.
New Varkon GUI Demo:
Latest update 6 December, 2006
Armin Faltl is working on a new graphical
user interface for Varkon. It's early days yet,
but already it looks very nice.
His GUI is an add-on that can be used with a
normal Varkon installation.(Added 30 May,
2007)
He's regularly supplying updated binary
releases so you can try them and provide
feedback for features, usability, and bug
reports. Eventually he will open-source the
code.
Have a look via the new GUI link on the
navbar. There're screenshots as well as
downloads.
Send us models you produce with the new demo,
and we'll post code and screenshots.
As a side-note, I saw on the Orebro site a
mention of a new Varkon
release,1.18B, in development.
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