The WorldWide Telescope Web Client

The “web client” of WorldWide Telescope (WWT) is a web application that lets you explore the universe from the comfort of your chair.

https://worldwidetelescope.org/webclient/

Learn more about WWT here.

The webclient is an AngularJS web app powered by the WWT WebGL Engine JavaScript library.

The WorldWide Telescope project uses an open governance model and is fiscally sponsored by NumFOCUS. Consider making a tax-deductible donation to help the project pay for developer time, professional services, travel, workshops, and a variety of other needs.

Building and Testing

In order to build and test the app, you need: Node.js, specifically the npm command. If you need to install Node.js, use your operating system’s package manager or visit nodejs.org for installation instructions.

The first time you check out these files, run:

npm install

Once that has been done, you can build the website with:

npx grunt dist-dev

This will create the app files in the dist subdirectory of your repository checkout. To test, all you need is a local HTTP file server pointing at that subdirectory. We recommend:

npx http-server dist

This server (and most other static-file servers) will print out a URL that you can visit to test out the web client locally.

There are also dist-prod and dist-localtest tasks that configure the build slightly differently — consult the profile-*.yml files, especially profile-prod.yml, to see the parameters that change. By creating a profile-localtest.yml file derived from profile-dev.yml, you can monkey with some low-level settings if you need to do so for testing purposes.

Deployment

Merges to the master branch of this repository will be built and automatically deployed to the testing version of the webclient:

https://worldwidetelescope.org/testing_webclient/

The production webclient is updated by creating a new release, which is done using Cranko workflows.

Getting involved

We love it when people get involved in the WWT community! You can get started by participating in our user forum or by signing up for our low-traffic newsletter. If you would like to help make WWT better, our Contributor Hub aims to be your one-stop shop for information about how to contribute to the project, with the Contributors’ Guide being the first thing you should read. Here on GitHub we operate with a standard fork-and-pull model.

All participation in WWT communities is conditioned on your adherence to the WWT Code of Conduct, which basically says that you should not be a jerk.

Acknowledgments

Work on the WorldWide Telescope system has been supported by the American Astronomical Society (AAS), the .NET Foundation, and other partners. See the WWT user website for details.

Legalities

The WWT code is licensed under the MIT License. The copyright to the code is owned by the .NET Foundation.