AstroGrav Help / Tutorial / Exercise 1 - Preparing the Sample Simulation

Exercise 1 - Preparing the Sample Simulation

This exercise teaches you how to prepare the sample simulation, and should take about 10 minutes to complete.

Opening the Sample Simulation

In order to follow these tutorial exercises, you will need to use one of the sample simulations that has been specially prepared for the purpose. This sample simulation shows the major members of the Solar System, and contains the Sun, the nine planets, and the seven moons with radii over 1,000km. To open it, go through the following steps.

If you don't already have AstroGrav running, double-click on the AstroGrav application icon () to start it running.
When the Open Simulation file chooser dialog is displayed, navigate to and open the Sample Simulations folder.
Select and open the Tutorial.ast file in the English folder.

The Tutorial sample simulation will then open, and you will see the simulation's three windows displayed on your screen.

Each of these three windows provides a different way of looking at the simultion's objects.

The Tutorial: Model window lets you view the simulation in the form of a three-dimensional interactive model.
The Tutorial: Table window lets you view the simulation in the form of a table, with each object's data occupying one row of the table.
The Tutorial: Tree window lets you view the simulation in the form of a tree showing the hierarchical structure of the system.

Positioning the Windows

The Tutorial sample simulation has been created on a screen with a resolution of 1,024x768 pixels. If you are using a screen with a higher resolution, you may wish to reposition the windows in order to reduce their overlap, and make better use of your larger screen. It's also a good idea to check that you have positioned the windows so that you can easily swap from reading these instructions on your browser to using AstroGrav itself. Don't resize any of the windows or change anything else in the simulation, as this may cause you problems following the tutorial later on.

If you've repositioned any of the windows, it's a good idea to save the Tutorial.ast file with your new window positions. This will save you having to reposition the windows every time you reopen the simulation. To save the Tutorial.ast file with your new window positions, choose the File / Save menu item (or the 'File / Save' icon tool).

Examining the Windows

Have a look at the three windows, clicking on them as necessary to bring them to the front, and check the following.

At the bottom of each window is an identical status bar that shows the simulation time/date on the left, and that shows the number of objects in the simulation on the right. Because the Tutorial: Tree window is very narrow, the number of objects displayed is truncated.
At the top of each window is a toolbar, and these toolbars are not identical. Some of the tools appear in every toolbar, whereas others are present in only one toolbar (because they are relevant to only one type of window). The tools are arranged in groups that correspond to the way that the menus are arranged.
Run the mouse pointer along the tools, and read the tool tips that pop up to tell you what each tool does.

Next: Evolving Simulations

You've now completed Exercise 1, and are ready to move on to Exercise 2, which teaches you how to evolve simulations.

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