Anyway, Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0 won’t be here soon. That’s why I decided to make a new small update, with small new features “fast” to implement. Here is Photo Sphere Viewer 2.6!

More natural movements

Since the very first version of Photo Sphere Viewer, the user can navigate through the panorama with their mouse. It was possible to control the speed of this movement, but it wasn’t really natural. Well, not for everyone.

That’s why I thought about a new way to move the panorama, more natural. Now, when you navigate into the panorama, you don’t move the sphere: you move a point.

It’s pretty simple: the point under your mouse is moved following your movements. The speed of the movement is yours.

If you don’t like this new movements you can retrieve the old ones, which still be maintained, with the option smooth_user_moves set to false.

A new way to manage cropped images

At the beginning, Photo Sphere Viewer was here to read panoramas taken by Google’s Photo Sphere. Now, it’s not the case anymore. More precisely, we can read any panorama.

The problem is that Photo Sphere clearly indicates into the file which size should be the panorama if it was complete (if it’s cropped). That allows PSV to retrieve the entire sphere in the right dimensions.

With the other panoramas, it’s not always possible. That’s why I added the option pano_size to define these dimensions. However, this idea was not so easy to use.

But I found a new method. With the option captured_view you can now define the captured angles of vision, those represented by the indicated image. As we know the maximal angles (360° and 180°), it’s easy to retrieve the entire sphere.

Horizontal and vertical angles can be indicated (one, the other or both). For example, if you only capture a 270° × 100° panorama, indicate:

captured_view: {
	horizontal_fov: 270,
	vertical_fov: 100
}

An overlay image

Finally, an option allows you to add an overlay image, over the panorama. With it, you can add a logo in a corner for instance. This option is named overlay and is an object which admits several parameters.

The first one, image, is required: it’s the image to display (URL or path). If the indicated image is too big (or too small), you can tell to Photo Sphere Viewer to resize it with the sub-option size (an object with width and height properties, as in CSS).

A last argument allows the control of the place of the image: position. It’s sub-option x controls the horizontal position (left or right), while y controls the vertical position (top or bottom).

What’s next?

Talking about overlay images, there’s an option asked by more and more users: being able to create tags and other indicators into the panorama itself, to target elements.

It’s pretty cool to see that this option is awaited, as I think about it since a long time now. However, I think it ill be easier to implement with Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0, and that’s why I prefer waiting for before implement it.

About Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0, I’m still working on the engine. I recently fixed a big bug, but it isn’t ready.

The official editor integrated in Scilab, SciNotes, is pretty annoying. A bad indentation, a completely crappy automatic completion of parentheses, or a syntax highlighting far to be ideal: the reasons to hate SciNotes are numerous.

Then, I decided once again to develop with Atom, so I needed a package for that. There was a package for Scilab, but it doesn’t exist anymore. So I developed my own.

Called language-scilab, it is available now and adds syntax highlighting for Scilab in Atom.

It doesn’t do anything more for the moment, but I think about enhance it, by adding the support for certain automatic completions or even a more automatic indentation.

It is possible to install an “official” development environment for Freefem++. The advantage is that it is then faster to execute a script. However, this IDE has a huge number of disadvantages. That’s why I prefer using another editor.

I have the habit to use Atom, so I wanted to use it. There was still an issue to fix: syntax highlighting. In fact, Atom is not really developed for mathematics.

That was the occasion for me to develop my first Atom package. Called language-freefem, it adds the support of Freefem++ language in Atom, with syntax highlighting.

The styles are standards so you won’t be disoriented: numbers will appear as they do in other languages, so do the instructions, etc.

All you have to do to use syntax highlighting for Freefem++ in Atom is installing the package like any other. Them, all is automatic: Atom will automatically detect that you are editing a Freefem++ file if you save it with the .edp extension.

Recently, I bought a Raspberry Pi 2 and wanted to use it as a media center, to use my old Raspberry Pi for something other. However, I encountered a problem: I noticed that the Pi 2 didn’t want to power my external hard drive, while the Pi 1 did it well.

Maybe you have the same problem, and that’s why I wrote this article: there’s a solution!

By default, the Raspberry Pi doesn’t deliver more than 0.6A through USB. We need to increase this limit in order to power an external hard drive. To do that, edit the /boot/config.txt file (with for exemple sudo nano /boot/config.txt) and add the following line to the end:

max_usb_current=1

Now reboot your Raspberry Pi (with sudo shutdown -r now for example). Magically, your Raspberry Pi can now deliver up to 1.2A through USB and that’s enough to power your external hard drive. Of course, you need a good power source: a microUSB adapter which delivers 5V and 2A is a good idea.

In fact, only one new option is present, allowing you to set your own eyes offset in VR mode. You will also be able to use the corresponding attribute, eyes_offset, for each shortcode, if you need a special value for a specific panorama, for some reasons.

Currently you won’t find the version 3.5 but the 3.5.1 one, with an updated Portuguese translation (thanks to Pedro Mendonça!).

And that’s all. As I said above, it’s a small update.

The good news is that WP Photo Sphere 4.0 is not so far away. I decided to release it right after Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0, so surely in early 2016. As promised, WPPS 4.0 will bring a brand new options panel, with clearer explanations for the different options and attributes.

Modified options

Before seeing the new options, there are some that now accept other values. I think about the long_offset and lat_offset options that now allow the use of degrees, as other options that except for an angle as a value.

One of the two required options has also been updated: the container one. Until now you had to give it an HTML element (generally a div). In Photo Sphere Viewer 2.5, you can use a string instead: the ID of an HTML element. So, if you use an ID, the corresponding HTML element will be retrieved, and you won’t have to do it by yourself.

Zoom!

A new option is available to control the zoom feature. More precisely, this new option is here to control the way the user can zoom. It’s a boolean, named allow_scroll_to_zoom. By default it is set to true and the user can zoom in and out by scrolling over the panorama. You can disable this feature by setting this option to false.

In PSV 2.5 you will also find a new public method to retrieve the current zoom level: getZoomLevel(). It returns a number between 0 and 100.

Some other features

Maybe you tried the VR mode appeared recently. I adjusted the eyes offset with a Google Carboard, but maybe you use another system or, more surely, you don’t have the exact same eyes offset than me. That’s why I created a new option: eyes_offset, allowing you to adjust this offset by yourself. In the future, I think about adding a button in the navigation bar, to let any user adjust this offset.

Since some versions, if CORS is enabled on a server, you can display distant panoramas with PSV. However, it was anonymous so it didn’t allow the use of credentials. If you want to, you can set the option cors_anonymous to false and you will be able to use credentials.

A new action is available: position-updated, triggered each time the position is changed, in any way.

Finally, if your panorama is a Google Photo Sphere one, Photo Sphere Viewer will read the XMP data. However, if you resized the panorama, these data are wrong. Now, Photo Sphere Viewer can detect wrong data and automatically recalculate the new dimensions.

What’s next?

Last time, I talked about Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0. You will be happy to learn that I worked on it. As I said before, I’ll create my own 3D engine for PSV 3.0, and I already have a working engine. However, it still needs some improvements. I don’t think Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0 will be here before the end of the year, but early 2016 is a good target.

Vertical animation controls

As in Photo Sphere Viewer 2.4, we find in WP Photo Sphere 3.4 some ways to control the vertical part of the animation. You can set the speed with the dedicated option in the options page, or you can use the attribute vertical_anim_speed to override this default value.

The target can also be selected with the dedicated option and the attribute vertical_anim_target.

Cropped panoramas!

If you have cropped panoramas that aren’t taken with Google’s Photo Sphere, you can indicate their sizes with some new attributes: full_width, full_height, cropped_width, cropped_height, cropped_x and cropped_y.

These attributes have the same names as the corresponding options in Photo Sphere Viewer, so you already know what they except. Note that they are all optional and, if the panorama is just cropped in its vertical part, you can for example just indicate a custom value for full_height.

Restricting the horizontal part

You can restrict what the user can see with the attributes min_long and max_long, and their corresponding options for default values. It’s useful for hiding a part of the panorama.

You can choose if the animation must be reversed if it reaches an edge of the allowed part with the attribute reverse_anim and its corresponding option.

Bug fixes

The fullscreen features isn’t broken anymore in Internet Explorer, and the box-sizing problem is fixed. Exactly as in Photo Sphere Viewer 2.4.

But you can note that WP Photo Sphere 3.4 doesn’t use Photo Sphere Viewer 2.4. In fact, there is a version 2.4.1 of Photo Sphere Viewer, with a bug fix for the maximum longitude: now you can set it to 360° without any problem.

Finally, you won’t have any problem if you update to WP Photo Sphere 3.4. It’s important to say it, as previous updates caused some troubles. Now, I have a better way to manage updates, so new options are not a problem.

What’s next?

Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0 is in development. Maybe some other versions will come before, followed by other versions of WP Photo Sphere. But there is also a big update for WP Photo Sphere which is planned.

In fact, I’ll change a lot of things in the code for WP Photo Sphere 4.0, with more proper ways to write some things. Also, the already promised new administration panel will be in WPPS 4.0. This big update won’t come after a Photo Sphere Viewer one, but that doesn’t mean you won’t find new features in it…

Control the vertical animation!

Since some versions, it’s possible to control the horizontal animation speed. However it wasn’t possible to choose the vertical speed. Now, it is, with a new option: vertical_anim_speed which accepts all the values accepted by anim_speed (for the horizontal speed).

Also, it’s possible to select the target of this vertical animation with vertical_anim_target. You indicate to this option a latitude, in radians or in degrees. When the animation starts, the vertical part will go to this latitude. By default, the user will always return to the equator but, now, you can change this.

Hide a part of your panorama

The biggest new feature of Photo Sphere Viewer 2.4 is the possibility to select the longitudes to see. You can in fact indicate a minimal and a maximal longitude to see with min_longitude and max_longitude. These values can be in radians or degrees. These options are useful if you want to hide a part of your panorama for some reasons.

But, what about the horizontal animation? What happens to it when the edge of your allowed zone is reached? Good question.

To answer to this question, what’s better than a new option? Named reverse_anim, this option is a boolean. If it is set to false, the animation will stop if the edge is reached. But you can set it to true, which is its default value. If it’s the case, then the animation will be reversed. You can now say “no” with a virtual head.

Defining minimal and maximal longitudes can also be useful if your panorama is not complete. But, for now, Photo Sphere Viewer can’t detect these cropped panoramas (unless they are taken with Google’s Photo Sphere).

That’s why you can define your own values with pano_size. This option is an object which can accept six properties:

• cropped_width and cropped_height: the cropped panorama size (if this size is the image one, you can forget these properties);
• full_width and full_height: the size your panorama should be if it wasn’t cropped;
• cropped_x and cropped_y: the coordinates of the cropped part relative to the full panorama (if the cropped part is centered you can forget these properties).

A new type of loader

Photo Sphere Viewer 2.4 comes with a third type of loader. You can still choose a simple text loader and an image one. Now, you can go further and indicate an HTML loader with loading_html.

You can indicate to this option a string representing the DOM tree to insert during the loading. You can also indicate it a DOM node to append.

A concrete example can be seen in the example1.html file, with a very simple HTML loader, animated with CSS.

Control the position!

If that’s a thing you want, you can force the user to see a specific point of your panorama with the new public method moveTo(). Pass it the coordinates of a point, and the user will see it.

You can also retrieve the point on which the panorama is currently centered with getPosition() which will gives you the coordinates of the point in radians. Degrees are available with getPositionInDegrees().

Some fixed bugs

The fullscreen feature was broken on Internet Explorer. Now, it’s fixed, so your users using IE can view your panoramas in fullscreen.

There still was a problem with box-sizing on some websites. It seems like some developers don’t like inherit as a value for box-sizing, so I fixed the navigation bar elements for these websites.

Now, the weird bug. In the example1.html file, I propose a file input to allow the uploading of a panorama, displayed with Photo Sphere Viewer. It seems like, only on some browsers and on some platforms, it doesn’t work. I found the problem: these browsers don’t like AJAX with local files.

However, I don’t see any way to fix it, but you shouldn’t see this problem again. In fact, now, when PSV sees a local file, it skips the AJAX function. So, problem solved? Not really…

If the AJAX function is here, it’s not for nothing, and it’s not useless: this function reads XMP data, and these data are used by PSV to see if the panorama is cropped, if it is taken with Google’s Photo Sphere.

If your panoramas are not cropped, the AJAX function is useless (that’s why the usexmpdata option is here). If you want to use local cropped panoramas, it’s still possible, but you must indicate by yourself the right sizes with the new pano_size option. I know that it’s not perfect, but I didn’t find a better solution.

What’s next?

Still no 3D renderer in this version? Yeah, that’s normal, as it’s not ready. However, I began developing it, and, for now, the progress is good. I had some troubles and I think others will come, but it’s a very interesting thing to develop, and I won’t give up.

I don’t know when this new renderer will be ready. The only thing I can say is that you have no chance to see it in the next few days.

This new renderer won’t come alone in a new version. It will be here for Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0, a version that will change a lot of things, mostly invisible for you, but important for the development. Photo Sphere Viewer 3.0 will be a very big update, that’s why you can be sure that it will take a while to develop.

A more simple and refined theme

This new theme is simpler, and above all more readable. Since the beginning of Tasse de Café the posts become more dense, with sometimes long tutorials. The previous theme didn’t provide, I think, a good experience for these long articles.

This theme insists on clarity and readability: a larger font size, a larger line height, in short, endless pages that are however faster to read because they are more readable.

It’s the end for posts thumbnails, as I was fed-up with searching for images that were useless for the content I provide. Henceforth, if there is an image, it’s because it’s useful, or because it’s a good illustration for the article.

In the posts lists like the one on the homepage, you won’t find thumbnails. A title, a brief excerpt. That’s all. Well, I chose that, but I am still not convinced, so maybe the posts will be complete in the future, with less posts per page. Don’t hesitate if you have any thought about it.

No ads anymore

Tasse de Café doesn’t display ads anymore. It’s not that I am against advertising, as I already said before, but it’s a choice I made.

I must say it: advertising is useful only if you have a minimal visitors number. Visits are regular on Tasse de Café, but it’s not enough for advertising. So it was useless, so I removed it. It won’t come back, even with more visits.

If you want to support me, I provide you an option: donating. Yeah, contrary to advertising, it’s not free for you, but you’re free to donate or not, and you’re free to donate what you want. All my projects are not centered around Tasse de Café and some of you asked me if there was a page where they can donate. It wasn’t the case. It’s still not: currently, the button is only in the sidebar, but I will soon create a dedicated page. When I have time.

Multilingual!

Since I stopped writing news on Tasse de Café for concentrating them on Fredzone, I often wondered what I’ll do for Tasse de Café. I never wanted to leave it, but I must admit that some might think it.

This new theme is also the occasion to take a new start. With it, I join the numerous developers who have a blog with their ideas, their tricks, etc.

You got it, and, anyway, that’s the case since several months: Tasse de Café will be the blog where I’ll talk about my projects, where I’ll provide some tutorials about web development (languages and tools), where you’ll also find some useful tricks. And where I’ll talk about my life, too. Sometimes.

Now, Tasse de Café is also multilingual: I think about writing each of my posts in French and in English. The reason is the reach: writing in English allows me to reach more people. But not only.

I write on SitePoint since a year now, and it’s an entirely English-speaking website. I love that. I love writing in English, as I love writing in French. I don’t want to give up neither one nor the other. So I do both.

Multilingual is managed with an excellent plugin: Polylang. And it does its work very well. If you read a post in French, all the website will be in French, even the sidebar or the theme. Same thing can be said about the English. Absolutely all the content is translated, it’s totally transparent for you.

Of course some changes occurred in the URLs. But it’s only a new language tag. Well, I also modified the URLs structure, but it’s a personal choice. Google won’t like that but I don’t really care about it.

If the plugin doesn’t display the right language or if, for any reason, you want the other, a link is available at the end of each page. Moreover, for translated posts, a link is displayed at the beginning of the post for switching the language.

What about the older posts?

Let’s talk about the translated posts. For now, all of them are in French. The whole website is translated, but not the posts. For the English, I’ll begin with this post. The other posts will be translated when I’ll have time (spoiler alert: it won’t be today).

It will also be the occasion to review the French versions. Some are old, and I want to change some details. But not on all of them.

I made a huge sorting in my posts. News posts are gone. However, if you still have the URL of one of these posts, you can still access it. I made that for kind people who linked to some posts here: I don’t want to give them dead links.

It’s time to work!

I still have a lot of work, with a lot of translations. If you want to subscribe, think about using the right URL for the RSS feed, the one provided by the button in the header. That way, you’ll only have the language you want.

Oh, yeah, the header displays a picture of my keyboard. I realized that my initials were on it. Funny, right? Well… maybe it’s just me.

The advantage of Sphoords is that it is aimed to be browser-independant, contrary to the API itself, as its implementation can sometimes vary, which is not a good thing.

Sphoords is here to retrieve a device orientation. With it, you will be able to determine to which point the device is oriented, to know which direction it “look at”.

Sphoords returns spherical coordinates, with usual conventions: a longitude between 0 and 2π and a latitude between -π/2 and π/2. Note that, if you prefer, you also have access to the coordinates in degrees.

For the moment, I provide you two concrete examples of applications of Sphoords. The first one is the orientation support in Photo Sphere Viewer.

The second example is a more useless one. But it’s still cool. You can retrieve it in the GitHub repo, and, after all, it is not so useless as it allowed me to develop this library. Sometimes, developing the application before the library can be useful.

This example is split into two pages. The first page must be displayed on a device compatible with the Orientation API, such as a smartphone for instance. The second page can be displayed on any device. Your computer, for example.

Now, move the device displaying the first page and look at the second page. You are drawing some lines with your smartphone. Isn’t it magical?

This example retrieves the smartphone orientation and displays it in almost real time (a maximal delay of 100 milliseconds can occur) on a sphere, displayed in 3D. You can even rotate the sphere with your mouse.

Well. I don’t see any other applications than developing the library itself, but I still love it.

Currently Sphoords is far to be perfect. The biggest problem is the API itself: it’s still in development and its implementation is different following the browsers. However, it works well on Firefox for Android, Chrome and Opera. I don’t know about the others.

You can retrieve Sphoords on GitHub, in version 0.1 for now. I’ll update it when new ideas will come.