March 2014: Geomview 1.9.5 release

August 2007: Geomview 1.9.4 release

The 1.9 releases of the Geomview source-code package can be compiled on systems that use a recent version of the gcc compiler (3.x, 4.0 or later), avoiding problems with building or using the earlier long-used Geomview 1.8.1 release. (1.8.1's can't seek back far enough (on pipe?) problem has been fixed, although Mac OS X still has some piping problems. We would appreciate advice from Mac OS X Geomview users.)

Geomview can be compiled and used on Apple's Mac OS X.

You will need to download and install Xcode to provide the gcc C compiler and other libraries and utilities to build Geomview. You will also need the X11 window system with its libraries and SDK, which provide OpenGL support (header files in an additional package on e.g. Leopard disk 1). Unless you have already added Motif support, you will need to install Lesstif, below, with sudo make install and giving your password, before installing Geomview. This prevents an error when building bound.o.
Geomview can be built without installing OpenGL, by doing:
./configure --without-opengl
make
make install
Once OpenGL support is installed:
./configure --with-opengl=/usr/X11R6
make
make install

If make fails to link at end with a 'cycle in dylib re-exports with /usr/X11/lib/libGL.dylib' error, use the following single-line, no-breaks command:
export LDFLAGS="-Wl,-dylib_file,/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework/Versions/A/Libraries/libGL.dylib:,/System/Library/Frameworks/OpenGL.framework/Versions/A/Libraries/libGL.dylib"
then repeat the previous instructions. This is caused by a linking bug in Leopard.

Geomview is also available under MacPorts, via:
port install geomview
Fink is an alternative to MacPorts; neither is required to build Geomview.

Geomview can be compiled and used on Microsoft Windows using Cygwin to emulate a unix environment.

Instructions on building Geomview under Cygwin are available.

Source code

Geomview 1.9.4 release source-code package
XFORMS for plugins (optional)

Note 1:You'll want some version of OpenGL and need some version of Motif in order to compile and/or run Geomview. If your system does not have OpenGL, you can use Mesa, a free software replacement for OpenGL; see http://www.mesa3d.org for details. If you don't have Motif, you can try using either LessTif (available from http://lesstif.sourceforge.net/) or OpenMotif. A binary distribution of OpenMotif 2.1.30 for GNU/Linux, with instructions for using it with Geomview, is available from this site here:
         download openmotif-linux-binary.tgz  (1.9M)   via http
The above distribution is much smaller and easier to install than the full OpenMotif distribution. If you do want the full Open Motif distribution, you can get it (including source) from either http://www.openmotif.com or http://www.opengroup.org/motif.

Note 2: Some of Geomview's external modules use the XFORMS GUI library. Geomview itself does not use XFORMS, so if all you want is Geomview itself, you do not need XFORMS. If you do want XFORMS, it's easy to get and install a binary XFORMS release for your system; read more about XFORMS.

February 2002: Binary Linux Distributions of Previous 1.8.1 Release

• Current Debian Packages
  Current Debian packages are avalable for installing Geomview on Debian-based systems, including Ubuntu and Raspbian:
          http://packages.debian.org/geomview
  These can be found in various package managers or installed with sudo apt-get install geomview
  Available in many flavours: alpha, arm, i386, ia64, m68k, mips, mipsel, powerpc, s390, and sparc!

• Obsolete Redhat RPMs
  Here are old binary RPMs of the old Geomview 1.8.1 release on Redhat-like systems (be sure to get both of these; the geomview RPM requires the lesstif RPM):
  • geomview-1.8.1-4.i386.rpm
  • lesstif-0.93.15-4.i586.rpm (you'll need this in order to install the above Geomview RPM.)
  If you want the XFORMS-based modules (plugins) for Geomview, then also get and install both of the following, though building a more recent XFORMS release is recommended:
  • xforms-0.89-3.i386.rpm
  • geomview-plugins-1.8.1-4.i386.rpm
  Thanks to Rex Dieter for creating these RPMs!

Previous Release: 1.8.1 (March 25, 2001)

• Source code
  Download geomview-1.8.1.tar.gz (source code)
  This release requires gcc 2.95 or earlier to compile, due to later changes in gcc stream-handling libraries. For a summary of new features in this release, see the release notes.
  It would be preferable to download a more recent release.

Even Older Releases

• Source code and binaries
  Geomview releases prior to the 1.7 series, including binary distributions for several Unix platforms, are available from the Geometry Center's Geomview Download Page

Documentation

• Download: Documentation Only (1.4M)     via http

  NOTE: You do not need this if you downloaded a source or binary distribution. This is just the Geomview documentation, packed up separately, for the benefit of those who might want to read the documentation locally without bothering to download the entire distribution.

• Online Documentation is also available for browsing.

Geomview Modules

• 'Modules' (also called 'external modules') are programs that extend Geomview's capabilities. The Geomview distribution includes a collection of several generally useful modules. Starting with Geomview release 1.8.0, the source tree is configured to allow additional optional modules to be dropped into place and compiled or installed. Many third-party modules for Geomview are also available.

  The following optional modules are currently available:

  • StageTools, a suite of modules that allow you to create surface, curves, polyehdra, compound objects, and more, directly in Geomview, and then animate them to make MPEG movies or animated GIF files for the web. You can tie input devices, such as sliders, check-boxes and type-in areas, to various parameters of your objects in order to make interactive demonstrations for research or educational use.

    To obtain StageTools, go to the StageTools Home Page and follow the download and installation instructions there.

  • The Orrery, a solar system simulator.

    The Orrery is available as a binary RPM for Linux (orrery-0.9.3-1.i386.rpm); to install it, you'll need to first install the RPM for Geomview itself; see above for details.

    The Orrery source is also available. To install the source, first download and unpack the source distribution of version 1.8.0 of Geomview or later. Then go to the Geomview project download page , download the most recent orrery source release (orrery-*.tar.gz), and unpack it into the "src/bin" subdirectory of your Geomview source tree. This will create a subdirectory called "orrery-*" (e.g. geomview-1.8.0/src/bin/maniview-0.9.3). Follow the instructions in the file INSTALL in that directory to configure and install the orrery.

  • Maniview, a research tool for mathematicians studying the geometry and toplogy of 3-manifolds.

    To install maniview, first download and install version 1.8.0 of Geomview or later. Then go to the Geomview project download page , download the most recent maniview release, and unpack it into the "src/bin" subdirectory of your Geomview source tree. This will create a subdirectory called "maniview-2.0.0" (e.g. geomview-1.8.0/src/bin/maniview-2.0.0). Follow the instructions in the file INSTALL in that directory to configure and install maniview.