xcruiser(6)
NAME
xcruiser - a filesystem visualization utility
SYNTAX
- xcruiser [ -display dpy ] [ -background color ] [
- -geometry geom ]
DESCRIPTION
- XCruiser (formerly known as XCruise) is a filesystem visu
- alization utility which compares a filesystem to a 3D-formed uni
- verse and allows you to "cruise" within it. It constructs a uni
- verse from directory trees, and you can navigate with a mouse.
- Here are simple analogies. Every file in a filesystem is
- shown as "a planet" with a solid circle. Similarly directories
- are "galaxies" (hollow rings) and symbolic links are "wormholes"
- (green curves). Unlike the real universe, a directory can con
- tain subdirectories inside, which forms a hierarchical filesys
- tem. The radius of each star is determined by its mass (i.e.
- filesize) and the position is determined by its name. Closer
- names are placed closer to each other. Shorter filenames are
- placed closer to the center of the galaxy.
OPERATIONS
- You have one main window. Planets are shown as solid cir
- cles in warm colors. Galaxies are cyan or white, and wormholes
- are green. The program also displays the current velocity and the
- name of current galaxy where your ship is in. The current direc
- tion is indicated in revolving green meters around the center of
- the screen. You can move the white cross cursor with a mouse. Un
- readable files or directories appear in magenta.
- There are two types of flying mode, which appear next to
- the velocity at the top left of the screen as a letter "P" (Po
- lar) or "C" (Cartesian). In polar flying mode, you can change
- your direction with a mouse and drive forward with the left but
- ton. In Cartesian flying mode in contrast, your ship moves in
- parallel without changing the direction. When you reach close
- enough to a galaxy, the ship "enters" the galaxy and slows down.
- Outer stars are displayed in darker colors.
CONTROLS
- Left button: Accelerate forward.
Middle button: Open the file (incompletely implemented).
Right button: Accelerate backward.
Z: Reposition the ship.
X: Change the flying mode.
V: View/hide the information.
M: View/hide the direction indicators.
Return or O: Open the file (incompletely implemented).
F: Freeze the ship.
Q: Quit the program.
Space: Accelerate forward.
Cursor keys: Move the cursor. - (You need to turn off auto key repeating when you're
- using keyboards.)
OPTIONS
- -display dpy
- Specifies an X display name.
- -background color
- Background color.
- -geometry geom
- Window geometry.
- Other options are configurable as X resources. See
- XCruiser.ad for details.
A DOCTOR'S WARNING
Please take care of motion sickness. (I'm not joking!)
HISTORY
- I developed XCruiser (XCruise) when I was a junior student
- in university. At that time I was inspired by the idea by a cer
- tain professor that tree-like filesystems are not necessarily ap
- propriate to us, since we sometime remember objects with spatial
- hints. First I developed this on my Macintosh SE/30, and then
- ported to X11 with a monochrome terminal. Hope that this program
- gives some idea to those who're developing user interfaces.
LICENSE
- XCruiser comes with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. This program
- is distributed under the GNU General Public License.
AUTHOR
Yusuke Shinyama (yusuke at cs . nyu . edu)
- http://www.unixuser.org/~euske/
- February 2003