SimSurface Project
 Development Page

Our current project is to port the SimSurface electron charge simulation to the Windows operating system.  Currently, the working versions are for the Macintosh and an Internet version on a web site (implemented in Perl, for techies). 

Development Goals:

• Port SimSurface to Windows

Production on SimSurface is currently being taken care of by David Joiner. Some menu functions that didn't work have been disabled. The help files have been updated, and added to the download bundle.

The next beta release, 7-17-2000SimSurf.exe, our fourth beta version, now has a notebook window that displays information iteratively during the annealing process, as well as a toolbox dialog box.  The toolbox allows the user to add, remove, pin (hold in place), or move the charges in real time.  Here are the following known bugs: 

• An extra electron is being removed at times when the user uses the toolbox to remove a charge
• The value of delta X is not correct
• Serializing (saving) the notebook sometimes leads to incorrect values

Beta 3 has been completed.  We now have a working version with color palettes for calculating the potential, using settings, and so forth.  In the works:  incorporating the already completed modeless dialog box to display information to the user (originally called Notebook);  adding more color palettes;  completing and fixing bugs in the saving and loading feature.  Beta version 3:  6-29-2000SimSurf.exe

A working beta which includes:  user-defined settings, iterative annealing process, and easy-to-use interface.  Our next goal is to add in the relaxation routine, field potential, and serialization (saving/loading) capabilities. 

Simsurface port has been started by me, Garrett Groff. Initial work has centered around restructuring of the original source code, separating operating system dependant calls from the numerical routines, and translating the numerical routines into a C++ class structure. Initial development of the Windows GUI (visual interface) has begun, and the SimSurface class is being incorporated into the Windows program.