Spiro Applet version 1.0

Click on one of the buttons below to pop up a Spiro applet drawing canvas. When the design canvas pops up, try picking one of the presets and then clicking on the button "Draw this Design!". For more help, click on the "Help" button, or view the help here.

Sorry, Java is not working. There are three possible causes for this:
• Your browser does not support Java (e.g. WebTV, older AOL, AtomNet, etc.) or it does not support Java 1.1 (e.g. Netscape 2-3, MSIE 3)
  Get a Java-capable browser from Netscape or Microsoft.
• Your browser has Java turned off.
  Turn on Java using Edit|Preferences|Advanced in Netscape, or Microsoft Internet Options/Security tab.
• Your firewall or provider is filtering out Java.
  Sorry, not much you can do about this.

 

[Note: the "Huge" canvas size will be too big for most computers, and does not seem to work in Netscape.]

Some Sample Images

Click on one of the thumbnails below to see some examples of what the Spiro applet can do.

The Spiro applet was Applet of the Day on 28 June, 2000, at JavaBoutique.

Background Information

The Spiro applet is an attempt to offer a fairly serious tool for creating a certain kind of graphic, while keeping things reasonably simple and portable. Written for Java 1.1, the Spiro applet has been tested and found to work on the following platforms:
• Netscape Communicator 4.06, Windows 98
• MS Internet Explorer 4.01, Windows 98
• Netscape Communicator 4.73, Windows 98
• Netscape Communicator 4.72, Windows NT
• MS Internet Explorer 5.0, Windows NT
• MS Internet Explorer 5.0, MacOS 9
• MS Internet Explorer 5.5, Windows 2000, Sun J2SE 1.3.1
• MS Internet Explorer 6.0, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.4.1
• Netscape Communicator 4.72, RedHat Linux 6.1
• Netscape Communicator 4.72, Solaris 8
• Netscape 7.02, Windows 2000, Sun J2SE 1.4.0
• Mozilla 1.3, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.3.1
• Mozilla 1.4, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.4.0
• Mozilla 1.4, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.4.1
• Mozilla 1.5, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.4.2
• Mozilla Firebird 0.6.1, Windows XP, Sun J2SE 1.4.2

The applet will not work in versions of Netscape older than 4.02, nor will it work in versions of MSIE older than 4.0. Also, the applet does not seem to work well in older versions of Netscape on the Macintosh (not sure why, might be memory).

Unlike most art-creation applets on the web, the Spiro applet allows you to save your work! Normally, saving your work locally from an applet is difficult, because Java security restrictions prevent applets from creating local files. The Spiro applet sidesteps Java's security restrictions by means of a small server-side CGI system that 'reflects' the applet-created image back to the web browser.

Running Spiro as an Application

For folks that would like to play with the Spiro applet on their own computer, Spiro is also available as a Java application. To run Spiro as an application, you'll need the Sun JDK or JRE, version 1.1.7 or later (1.2.1 or later recommended). The application version of Spiro allows you to save drawings to your local disk as standard Targa (.tga) image files. You can download the Java JAR file for Spiro, and obtain the Sun Java Runtime if you need it, from the links below:

• Spiro 1.0 application: spiro.jar
• Spiro 1.0 source code, zipped
• Java 2 Platform downloads

Once you have the Java Runtime installed, you should be able to run Spiro by typing the command java -jar spiro.jar. (Under MacOS, of course, you can't type commands. Follow the MacOS help for running Java applications.)

The Spiro application is available free of charge, and unencumbered by any warranty or claims of suitability for any particular purpose. Use at your own risk. Source code for Spiro is available on request, email to ziring@home.com.

 

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This page written by Neal Ziring, last modified 9/15/00.