World Wind Java 0.3 is out

It has been five month since WWJ 0.2 was released at the Java One conference last may. A lot of work has been done since by Tom Gaskins's team. Several code updates have been posted on the forum, so you may already have a good idea of what to expect.... so here comes the new and enhanced World Wind Java SDK 0.3 (.zip 13M) and Java Web Start Demo.

Example application template - globe

San Francisco - USGS Urban Ortho layer

Here is an unsorted list of changes i can think of:

Since 0.2.5

• Polylines have had a major update. They can now gently follow the underlying terrain, avoiding intersections, and should become a viable alternative to SurfacePolylines. Some optimization is still needed though.
• Stereo anaglyph capability has been added with a new AnaglyphSceneController and a corresponding example application.
• The SkyGradientLayer has been incorporated and nicely teams up with the FogLayer to provide some atmospheric effects to the globe.
• An interactive terrain profile tool has been added with a corresponding example.

Before 0.2.5

• There was a Point class in 0.2.0 which has been replaced with Vec4. Most Point methods are available in Vec4, but with a '3' at the end of the name - eg: getLength3().
• Some major reorganization has taken place in the packages structure with the addition of many - more categorized, sub-folders.
• An example package has been added. It contains an application template with some basic components and a growing list of simple applications, each showing a particular feature of the SDK.
• Applet templates, one using javascript interactions, have been added with appropriate deployment notes in the examples.
• SurfaceShapes quality and diversity have been improved - see Shapes example.
• Mouse dragging support of objects has been added - see DraggingShapes example.
• There has been major enhancements to the OrbitView with, among other things, the addition of ViewStateIterators, Animators and Interpolators. Click on the world map to see it in action or have a look at the WWJApplet javascript API.
• Memory management and garbage collection have been greatly improved, reducing significantly the memory footprint.
• Tools to access WMS servers have been added - see WMSLayerManager example.
• Single image layers have been incorporated - useful for applets faster load-and-start. See StartupImage example and BMNGOneImage layer.
• Stars, world map, scale bar, fog and sky color layers have been incorporated.
• Support for runtime statistics has been added - see RuntimeStatistics example.
• A Worldwind.shutdown method has been added
• Support of tabbed panes and other potentially tricky UI configurations has been improved - see UsageInTabbedPane example.
• Ground and air tracks support and rendering has been added - see PipeTracks example.
• New USGS and Earth Observatory layers have been added.
• Spherical and ellipsoidal triangle methods have been added to LatLon and Position classes.

There are surely many other improvements and bug fixes i'm forgetting here...

Check this World Wind Java forum thread for the release readme.txt and follow up comments. Also: WorldWind Java home page at NASA Learning Technologies and World Wind Central.

More screenshots:

Tracks and pipes example

Polylines following terrain - Shapes example

Tracks example

WMS Layer Manager example

Terrain profiler example

Anaglyph stereo example

Atmosphere entry over New Zeland