Scientific Computing and Visualization Group
Boston University

Introduction

The DAFFIE software distribution has three primary components: the viewer, the soundserver, and the event manager. The viewer loads and displays 3D models; the soundserver plays localized digital audio files; and the event manager distributes information about the virtual environment among DAFFIE sites. (For more information, please see the DAFFIE system overview.)

Choose computers on which to run DAFFIE

For best performance these three components should run on different computers. At Boston University, we run the viewer on an SGI Onyx2 (which is connected to an ImmersaDesk), we run the soundserver on an SGI Indy, and we run the event manager on an Origin 2000. It is possible to run the viewer and the soundserver on the same machine, but this may have an adverse impact on navigation speed, maximum scene complexity, soundserver performance, etc.

Make a directory for the DAFFIE installation, and untar the tar file

Note: Although the DAFFIE software distribution occupies less than 50 MB, typical DAFFIE environments (models, sound files, etc.) require 500 MB – 1 GB of disk space.

  % mkdir /daffie
  % cd /daffie
  % tar xf DAFFIE.tar
  % ls -l
  total 4
  drwxrwxr-x    4 putnam   scv           33 Jul  1 17:35 EventMgr
  drwxrwxr-x    7 putnam   scv           76 Jul  1 17:34 Sound
  drwxrwxr-x    6 putnam   scv           65 Jul  1 17:33 Viewer
  drwxrwxr-x    2 putnam   scv            9 Jul  1 17:32 Doc
  %

If all the computers on which you are running DAFFIE have access to this directory (e.g., through NFS), the installation is complete. Otherwise, you must untar the distribution onto each computer you are using. Note that the software for each function (viewer, soundserver, and event manager) is self-contained, so it is necessary to untar only the directory you need for each computer. For example, to untar the sound software onto the soundserver computer, do the following:

  % mkdir /daffie
  % cd /daffie
  % tar xf DAFFIE.tar Sound
  % ls -l
  total 4
  drwxrwxr-x    7 putnam   scv           76 Jul  1 17:34 Sound
  %