Steps to Get Preston Lees Starfield Ruby Processing App Running on Linux

Update 13th October 2011, there should be no need for this since ruby-processing version 1.0.10, linux no longer requires fullscreen to run opengl, further 64 bit system should be automatically detected.

The original screencast can be seen here http://www.prestonlee.com/2010/05/17/3d-osx-applications-with-ruby-processing-screencast/

If you are up and running with GitHub you may wish to download the code directly from Preston Lees GitHub (and modify the starfield.rb as below) otherwise follow instructions below:-


1. Install ruby processing (follow the instructions at http://wiki.github.com/jashkenas/ruby-processing/getting-started)

2. You should create a directory starfield, and create a sub directory data

3. Download Univers66.vlw.gz from http://github.com/preston/Starfield and put it in the data folder

4. Create starfield.rb, star.rb and asychronous_object.rb in the starfield directory here is the code:-




5. In a terminal cd to the starfield directory and enter rp5 run starfield.rb

If you want export the app you will need to modify starfield.rb to require asychronous_object.rb.

Because there is currently an issue with resizing opengl applications with linux you will need to run the app in full screen
mode, use the escape key to quit full screen mode. If it hangs alt tab to another console pgrep java to get the offending process id
the issue kill -s KILL pid where pid is the process id.

Possible issues are:-

Your OS is hogging the graphics driver (solution turn down the level of eye candy)
You don't have a working 3D graphics driver (solution install a 3D graphics driver)
You are running a 64 bit operating system see my last post

Here is a screen-shot of the app running on Kubuntu, with the desktop eye candy turned down.