This is the top level of the popup menus.
Note that the popup menus only work when the
right mouse button is clicked down in the control
panel or command window.
The 'Run' item is exactly the same as the
'Go' button
on the control panel.
No reason is known for the difference in
nomenclature.
The 'Info' item gives quick access to the main
sources of information about KnotPlot and it's
author.
'Startup Info Screen' will give you the brief text
message you see in the view window when you start
KnotPlot.
It's likely you already know about the
'KnotPlot Manual' item.
This gives you the main (local) hypertext manual.
The manual is located in the KnotPlot
resource directory.
The remaining two items reference remote HTML pages,
unless you're running KnotPlot at it's home location (currently
the Department of Computer Science
at the University of British Columbia).
When one of the last three menu items is selected, KnotPlot will automatically start up a Web browser with the indicated page. Watch the command window to see exactly what is sent to the shell. If nothing happens it's likely that the browser cannot be found in your path. If that's the case you may have to set an environment variable as in:
setenv KNOTPLOT_WWW_BROWSER /usr/bin/X11/netscape
or whatever.
Also, if you prefer to use a different browser from the
default (Netscape), you can enter something like
setenv KNOTPLOT_WWW_BROWSER Mosaic
in your shell before you run KnotPlot.
These menu entries give you a more-or-less unnecessary
alternate method of loading knots and links other than
the
load
and
save
commands.
The 'Sphere On/Off' toggles the drawing of the
utility sphere,
explained on another page.
The 'Stereo On/Off' entry will toggle stereoscopic viewing if your monitor is capable of it. To exit stereo mode, hit the ESC-key.
Choosing 'Head Coupled Stereo' causes KnotPlot to enter
Fish Tank Virtual Reality mode on machines with the right
equipment.
See an early
pioneer of
Fish Tank VR for expert information.
These menu entries allow you to quickly change
the current control panel.
At the moment, the only item in the 'Extras' section
is one that allows you to access the
tangle calculator.