Larry Finger ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) and Martin Kroeker
([EMAIL PROTECTED]) announce the release of DRAWxtl V3.0.
The Web site for the program is http://www.lwfinger.net/drawxtl, where the
executables for Windows and PC, and the source code for Linux or UNIX can
be downloaded. Although the program was designed as command-line code,
front-end shells in Visual Basic for Windows, and Tcl/Tk for Linux and UNIX
have been prepared and are included in the distribution.
This program, which runs on Windows PC, UNIX, Linux and Mac computers,
reads a basic and simple description of the crystal structure, which
includes unit-cell parameters, space group, atomic coordinates and thermal
parameters, and outputs a geometry object that contains polyhedra, spheres
or ellipsoids, bonds, and the unit-cell boundary. The description of the
structure may come from a variety of standard structure description files
including CIF, SHELXTL, GSAS and CSD. The user does not view the crystal
structure directly, but DRAWxtl produces a scene description files for the
popular POV ray-tracer program, and a Virtual Reality Modeling Language
(VRML) browser. Both VRML 1.0 and VRML97 are supported.
For previous users of DRAWxtl, the principle changes in this release are as
follows:
1. Abandoned support of 16-bit versions. All Windows compilations are now
done with Microsoft Visual C++6.0.
2. Windows shell changed to VB6.0 to support long file names.
3. PC Version now handles 20,000 vertices, rather than 6,000.
4. The space-group section of import_fdat, which reads a Cambridge
structure database file, has been improved and bugs have been fixed.
5. The X-Windows Tcl/Tk shell has been modified to include an on-line manual.
6. Added 2 second delay at end of DRAWxtl for user to read screen messages.
7. Fixed rotation of labels on vector triples in POV output.
8. Simulated orthographic projection (-C run-time option) for VRML 1.0 added.
9. On-line help added to the Windows shell.
10. The rem and titl commands are made case insensitive.
11. Synonyms 'polyfudge' and 'polylimit' are added to 'polytolerance'.
12. The 'clip' command is added to show half bonds at the edge of drawings
for three-dimensionally linked structures.
13. The 'polyedge' command has been added to permit different color edges
for different polyhedra.
14. The 'depthcue' command added to set the extent to which edges close to
the viewer are enlarged.
15. The 'list' distance command has been added to permit the user to
control the maximum distances printed in the listing file.
16. Changed code so that ellipsoids for atoms with anisotropic thermal
parameters are not represented as ellipsoids unless the 'ellipsoids'
command is issued.
17. Formal parameters added to prototype statements to catch improper usage
of routines.
18. Fixed bug that gave wrong octant for 'cutout' statements.
19. Fixed bug that prevented changing total probability included in ellipsoids.
For the user, the most important changes are the proper implementation of
the 'cutout' command, the implementation of the 'clip' command, and the
fixing of rotations. In some previous versions, the POV and VRML pictures
were inconsistent, but no longer.
The version of the program for the Power PC Macintosh has been compiled by
Heinz-Guenter Hermanns, RWTH-Aachen, Germany. At present, we do not have a
Mac shell for the program, but have implemented it with a SIOUX Console in
the Code Warrior program development system.
--
Larry W. Finger [EMAIL PROTECTED]
1400 Colorado St. Phone: +1 (240) 463-2051
Boulder City, NV 89005 FAX: +1 (209) 844-9855
http://www.lwfinger.net/ <---- Note New URL and E-mail address
