Stella Version History

5.4 | 5.3 | 5.2 | 5.1 | 5.0 | Older versions

Stella 5.4, 10th May 2014

New in Small Stella, Great Stella, and Stella4D
Link from Stella to online paper models

  • Polyhedra may now have an internet link associated with them. Found in the Info window below the polyhedron's name. Right-click on it to open or edit the link. Each provided polyhedron that I have physically built now has a link to online photos of my paper model.
  • Added Coxeter's symmetry symbols to the display. Read about symmetry groups and their notations at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_spherical_symmetry_groups.
  • Added ability to cut just one edge in Cutting Mode with Shift+Right-click, rather than all edges of the same type (Shift+Left-click).
  • Added "Scale→Base Circumference" to view and set the circumference of a model's circumsphere.
  • Added "Help→Download Companion Android app MoStella".
  • Adjusted the default transition times, e.g. going to next/previous model is much faster now (0.5 seconds down from 2.0).
  • Search for compounds more intuitively by giving number first, e.g. "5 Cubes" rather than "Cubes 5".
  • Fixed: Search failed to find some polyhedra, e.g. "4-Freq" didn't find "4-Frequency Icosahedral Geodesic Hemisphere".
  • Search files in the polyhedron library with abbreviated words, e.g. "5 c" will find "Cubes 5" and "4-f t" will find "4-Frequency Tetrahedral Geodesic Hemisphere".
  • Show image scale/position in status bar when adjusting. Handy for matching scale/position of two images on separate faces.
  • Improved sphere mapping quality near poles when printing.
    Symmetry symbols
  • Give error for invalid equations.
  • Fixed: Small Stella and Great Stella showed face counts and subsequent data in the wrong column in the polyhedron list (Stella4D was fine).
  • Fixed: Face-map displayed on image in Image Mode was wrong when image was clamped or had borders.
  • Fixed: Don't show background image in printed nets with images on faces.
  • Fixed: Mouse wheel for zoom didn't always work straight away.
  • Fixed: When printing 2D cross-sections of 3D polyhedra, the "Actual size" option didn't work.
  • Fixed: When entering number to define base of prism or antiprism, prompt said "Enter a value for" instead of "Enter a value for <N>".
  • Fixed: Entering 0 or negative number to define base of prisms and antiprisms would crash. Now gives error.
  • Fixed: Some users on Windows 8 would sometimes have to re-enter serial number more than once.

New in Great Stella and Stella4D only

  • Added model of one of the 12 parts of the Topological Small Stellated Dodecahedron so people can make this model more easily.
  • Recognise when models are radially convex. This allows nets to be created much faster in some cases for convex and radially convex polyhedra.
  • Fixed: Added missing subsymmetry of the octahedral symmetry group.
  • Fixed: Face colours were not restored after changing to a subsymmetry group then hitting undo.
  • Fixed: Waterman polyhedra were scaled too big.
  • Fixed: Crash sometimes when creating zonish polyhedra.
  • Fixed: "Faceting→Delete All Facets" could crash with net view open.
  • Fixed: Saving and reloading file during enumeration of stellations would forget where it was up to when reflexibility was enabled.
  • When enumerating stellations takes a long time, more decimal places are now shown when the completion percentage passes 99.9%. Previously you couldn't see what was happening past 99.9999% since only 4 decimal places were given.

New in Stella4D only

  • Added some models to the "4D Library→3D Aspects" library:
  • When converting a projection of a 4D polytope to a 3D base model, options about which faces to include were only given when some cells were hidden. Now the question is always asked when the cells are full size. Previously you couldn't stop all the hidden internal faces from being included too, making nets difficult to obtain.

Stella 5.3, 20th April 2013
10 Tetrahedra

New in Small Stella, Great Stella, and Stella4D

  • Updated "Tetrahedra 10" compound with better coloring and nets.
  • Remember cut edges and per-edge tab setting in .stel files.
  • Fixed: GIF images came in black and white (bug appeared in version 5.2).
  • Fixed: Images on hemi-faces were not projected properly.
  • Fixed: editing multiple image options always changed projection even when no projection option was selected.
  • Fixed: Save As could stop rotation, morphing etc and thus not save it in the file.
  • Improved texture memory management.

New in Great Stella and Stella4D only

  • Improvements to image/video export:
    • Added option to save settings without exporting.
    • Fixed: exporting AVIs would often crash, depending on the compression and dimensions chosen.
    • Fixed: when exporting image/video, selected orientation was not remembered as default for next time.
      Images on hemi-faces
    • Fixed: switching between "Current orientation" and other choices didn't reset things properly.
    • Fixed: during video export, switching between tour and other animation could cause a few problems.
    • Fixed: mouse inertia is now recovered after going to the Export Image/Video dialog.
    • Fixed: stepping backwards during video preview could jump at frame where transitions start.
    • Fixed: tour video export didn't work properly unless "Current orientation" was selected (setting shouldn't affect tours).
    • Fixed: resources were not freed properly when AVI export failed due to incompatible settings (e.g. Xvid codec with odd width), meaning the same file could not then be written to again until restarting the program.
  • Moved noble faceting of snub cube from Faceting folder into Bruckner folder.
  • Fixed: not all faces were displayed when using a sub-symmetry group on a model with coplanar faces (bug appeared in version 5.2).
  • Fixed: a rare occasion when tabs weren't right.
  • Fixed: very rarely some stellation faces weren't recognised properly and were left unfilled in the Stellation and Net views.

New in Stella4D only

  • Fixed: whole model disappeared when selecting a cell while 4D tunneling through a cell.
  • Fixed: during video export, 4D rotation didn't rotate through selected cell/vertex as it was supposed to.

Stella 5.2, 23rd March 2013

New in Small Stella, Great Stella, and Stella4D

  • Sped up image loading and improved quality a little.
  • Added "Image→Blocky Pixels when Close-Up".
  • No more snapping to base/dual at either end of dual morphing. I think it's smoother this way, especially when faces have images.
  • Fixed: some dual morphing views were rendering incorrectly when faces had images.
Topological model

New in Great Stella and Stella4D only

  • Added models to the library:
    • Added "Facetings/Faceted Snub Cube - Noble".
    • Added "Parts/Medial Triambic Icosahedron Pt1".
    • Added "Topological" category.
  • Improved performance of shapes with many coplanar faces, e.g. after "Poly→Subdivide Faces" with a high number:
    • Faster to create.
    • Much faster to display.
  • Fixed memory leak when exporting animation as a series of image files. Could cause crash for long or hi-res animations.
    120 Cell
  • Fixed: sometimes selecting one face would change lighting on all other coplanar faces.

New in Stella4D only

  • Added the "3D Aspects" category to the 4D library. Contains ready-made 3D models based on 4D polytopes.
  • Fixed: library of 4D models wasn't installed properly in Stella4D Pro.

Stella 5.1, 2nd January 2013

New in Small Stella, Great Stella, and Stella4D

  • Improvements to background image:
    Background showing
    through model
    • Added "Image→Show BG Image Through Model" to allow BG image to show through model.
    • Added "Image→Background Image Fit" to fit BG image into window in different ways.
    • BG image and options are now remembered between sessions.
    • BG image is now shared between all views and remembered when changing view layout.
  • Fixed: sometimes tabs would be wrong in 3D folding view.
  • Put appropriate titles on toolbars when free-floating instead of no title (no change when docked).

New in Great Stella and Stella4D only

  • Added more options to the zonohedron dialog box, and made the layout a bit clearer and more consistent. Can now add a zone based on a single edge direction or all edges of the same type.
  • May now use "Poly→Create Convex Hull" with an incomplete faceting.
  • Fixed: stereo separation of BG image was inconsistent in Stellation view.
  • Removed unintended dependency on stellation when Faceting Preview view is open and spheres/cylinders used for vertices/edges (speeds things up in some cases).
  • Improved introductory message in Faceting Preview view when no facets have been created yet.
  • Fixed: sometimes curves weren't drawn on nets when using "Display→Show Intersections with Spheres".

New in Stella4D only

  • Improvements to 3D export from a 4D model:
    • Spheres/cylinders are now scaled better, based on their 4D projection, instead of all coming out the same size.
    • Fixed: too many spheres exported sometimes.
    • Fixed: edge cylinders were sometimes created in the wrong places.
    • Fixed: when hiding all cells in 4D view in order to just export spheres and cylinders, all cells were exported too.

Stella 5.0, 30th September 2012
Contents

Changes to licensing and introducing Stella4D Pro

  • I have changed the Stella license slightly. Commercial use now requires purchase of the new Stella4D Pro product. The software is currently the same as Stella4D except for the licensing, which allows commercial use, e.g. of exported images and video.

New in Small Stella, Great Stella, and Stella4D
(References to cells and hyperplanes below apply to Stella4D only)

  • Animated transitions between polyhedra!
    Transitions
    • As you step through the polyhedra, each one will fly off the screen as the next one flies into place.
    • Use "Options→Transition Options" to customise the transitions used in different situations. Polyhedra can slide and spin off the screen, explode/implode, grow/shrink, or orbit each other as one replaces the other.
    • Hit Esc to quickly skip a transition.
    • Enable/disable transitions with "Options→Enable Transitions".
  • Animated polyhedral slideshows called "tours".
    Polyhedral tour
    • Choose transitions between shapes in the tour. You can even have transitions between different types of view, or from 3D to 2D and back (some types of transition only apply to some views).
    • Lots of new controls for putting tours together and playing them back.
    • Each shape in the tour may be spinning, morphing, unfolding etc.
    • Right-click on item in tour list to open a context menu. Select "Inherit layout" to continue animation from the previous item, e.g. to match spin from one to the next.
    • Hit Esc when playing a tour to stop it.
    • Tours can be exported as videos (Great Stella and Stella4D only).
    • See example YouTube video here.
  • Improvements to nets.
    Single tab method
    Double tab method
    • Added tabs! Choose your preference for the single or double tab methods (or no tabs at all). Print nets with tabs, and see tabs folding up in 3D.
    • Select paper colour from a list to print matching nets (no longer need to find a net of the colour you wish to print first).
    • Option to print edge connection IDs on nets to help with construction. Especially useful with tricky colouring schemes. Can also show these in the unfolded and folding net views using "Nets→Show Edge Data→Edge Connection IDs".
    • When nets don't fit on the page, the user is asked whether to reduce the size of the model so they just fit. Now this message also shows how much the model will be scaled down by.
    • May now create the convex hull of a 3D folding net.
    • Fixed: Nets for models with asymmetric colouring (e.g. one colour per face) sometimes had incorrect colour arrangement (e.g. great icosahedron nets). Some data printed on nets could also be wrong.
  • Improvements to morphing between duals.
    Morph by tilting
    to compound
    • New methods for morphing between duals.
      • "View→View Duals Morphing→By Tilting to Compound"
      • "View→View Duals Morphing→By Tilting to Rectify"
    • Renamed "Morph with Rectangles" to "Morph by Expansion".
    • Morphing by Expansion now uses a colour averaged from neighbouring faces for the new rectangular faces, rather than a fixed predefined colour.
  • Improved selection
    • Simplified selection. Now just use Shift+Left-click to select faces, edges, vertices, or rotational symmetry axes (when displayed with "s").
    • Ctrl+Right-click to select only edges.
    • Edges and rotational symmetry axes are newly selectable items in version 5.0. Along with faces and vertices as before, they may be used to orient the model by looking at or sitting on them, and for such things as setting the cross-section direction.
  • Improved navigation
    Pivot around
    symmetry axis
    • Use Space+Right-drag to pivot around an axis through the last selected item (cell, face, edge, vertex, or rotational symmetry axis).
    • As with other navigation, release mouse button while dragging for the pivot to continue on its own.
    • You may perform normal tumble and twist navigation while the new pivot continues.
    • If you find this more useful than the normal Right-drag to twist, you can swap the functionality of Right-drag and Space-Right-drag with "Options→Right-drag to Pivot Around Selected Item" or the matching toolbar button.
    • Added "View→Camera→Use Default". This does more than "View→Orientation→Default Orientation" as it also resets to the default field-of-view and fits the model to the screen.
    • Added "View→Orientation→Rotate Around X Axis" and similar for Y and Z, giving finer control when required over the exact model orientation. The axes referred to are screen-aligned: X to the right, Y up, and Z out of the screen.
  • Improvements to measurement mode.
    Distance between
    vertex and facial plane
    • Can now measure distance and angle between two items, where each item may be a point, line, plane or hyperplane (previously only distance between two points could be measured).
    • Distance and angle are shown on screen (previously only in status bar).
    • New button appears in measurement mode to set a point at the centre of the model.
    • Cross-section direction may be set based on point, line, plane or hyperplane defined in Measurement Mode. Section depth is also set to align with the item.
    • 4D projection direction may be set based on a point, line, plane or hyperplane defined in Measurement Mode (Stella4D only).
    • "Stellation→Stellation Planes" has new button "Add Measurement Plane", to add a stellation plane based on a plane defined in Measurement Mode (Great Stella and Stella4D only).
  • More control over edges.
    • Select edges, using Ctrl+Right-click.
    • When selected, edge length is shown in status bar.
    • Use "Scale→Edge Length" to set the scale of the model based on the length of a selected edge.
    • List of edge types shown in Info window.
    • Each edge may have its own colour. Set the colour of a single edge, or all edges of the selected type.
    • Cylinder edges may use the same colour as normal line edges (thus allowing them independent colouring too).
    • Various edge colouring schemes.
    • Edges may be shown/hidden by type, by colour, or individually.
    • Colour and hidden state of edges is saved in .stel files and memory slots.
    • Added "Display→Hide Edges & Vertices Between Hidden Faces". When enabled, any edges or vertices surrounded only by hidden faces will also be hidden, regardless of whether they have otherwise been flagged as hidden. This replaces the previous option from Stella4D "4D→When Hiding Cells, Hide Vertices/Edges Too" which only worked in 4D.
  • More control over vertices.
    • Added option to colour vertices according to the colour of their dual face. Allows independent colouring per vertex. "Color→Vertex Colors→Color Vertices Same as Dual Face"
    • Individual vertices may now be hidden. They are hidden in sync with their matching face in the dual.
    • New option to specify actual vertex-sphere radius rather than setting it as a fraction of some other measurement.
  • Improvements to images on faces.
    • Added spherical and cylindrical image mapping.
    • Added option to keep images upright. Only applies when image is projected separately onto each face. When used, instead of snapping to edges when rotating, we snap to portrait and landscape.
    • May project image towards a selected item, or align the height of the image, or axis for spherical/cylindrical mapping, to the selected item.
    • When in Image Mode, and a face is selected, feint lines are drawn on the full image to indicate face mapping.
    • Middle button may now be used anywhere in place of Left+Right, so you can use Shift+Middle to rotate image too.
      Spherical image map Net of model with
      spherical image map
  • Added Geomag-style rendering.
    Geomag
    Icosadodecahedron
    Geomag rocket
    Geomag picture frame
    Geomag castle
    • Render polyhedra as if made using Geomag's magnetic construction kit.
    • Common polygons not available from Geomag are subdivided using ones which are.
    • Colours for faces and edges are limited to those available from Geomag.
    • Able to recognise in many cases whether or not a model can be built using Geomag.
    • When images are applied to faces, they appear as if using Geomag's Deko panels. When nets are printed only the parts required for Deko panels are printed, ready to cut out and insert into the Deko panels.
    • New Geomag Library containing models designed specifically for Geomag.
  • Improvements to file browser.
    • When browsing to open/save a .stel file, select an existing file to see information about it at the bottom of the browser. Number of cells/faces/edges/vertices are shown, along with the first line of the comment, if one has been set. (Please re-save files from previous versions to enable all this).
    • When browsing to open/save an .OFF file, select an existing file to see the number of faces, edges and vertices. Note: number of edges may be incorrect, as the format does not require this to be provided correctly in the file. It will probably either be correct, or zero.
    • When browsing to open/save an image file, select an existing image file to see a preview of it along with some properties.
    • When browsing to open/save a text file (e.g. loading text onto faces or saving text from faces), select an existing text file to see a preview of the first couple of lines.
  • Improvements to built-in polyhedron browser.
    • Added search feature! Search the polyhedron library based on name and/or vertex/edge/face/cell counts. A range may be specified for the latter (e.g. find all polyhedra with between 12 and 30 faces). Comprehensive tooltips help explain what's what.
    • Find either the first match only, or find all matches and show them under the new "Search Results" category.
    • When looking at the "Search Results" category, use the "Locate search result" button to locate a particular item in the main list.
    • After opening a model from the "Search Results" list, step through other results with the arrow keys.
    • New tree structure for categories (e.g. Platonic and Kepler-Poinsot both come under the Regular category).
    • Added new columns to browser: index, cell count, face count, edge count, vertex count, Wenninger number, Maeder number.
    • Click on a column header to sort polyhedra according to entries in that column.
    • Browser position and size is now remembered.
    • Fixed: the browser can now be resized properly.
    • Fixed: Some entries had Wenninger numbers when they shouldn't have.
  • Improvements to 3D stereoscopic display.
    • Improved calculations for 3D stereoscopic projections (proper asymmetric frusta rather than "toe-in").
    • Stereo effect is a little stronger now.
    • Background image now supported during stereo display.
    • Made stereo effect more consistent for stellations.
    • Fixed small difference in lighting between left and right images.
    • With red/blue glasses etc, symmetry axes and reflection planes show up more clearly.
    • Panning left/right now works with parallel/cross-eyed.
    • Changing view layout now maintains stereo mode.
    • Changed "Wall-eyed" to "Parallel-eyed" on menu. More common usage and more obvious meaning.
  • Esc key now performs more functions. It performs the first appropriate action on the list below.
    • Skip transition (new)
    • Stop playing tour (new)
    • Stop all mouse inertia (new)
    • Cancel augmentation preview (Great Stella and Stella4D only)
    • Cancel creating facet (Great Stella and Stella4D only)
    • Exit any mode back to normal mode
    • Exit full-screen display
    • Exit 3D stereoscopic display (new)
  • Improvements to Info window.
    • Shows when one face/vertex type is a reflection of another.
    • Shows list of edge types.
    • Select part of compound in Info window to select a face/cell from that part.
    • Shows surface area of base and dual.
  • Added "Options→Allow Explosion Inertia to Implode". Decides whether Ctrl+Shift+Left-drag explosion inertia allows the faces to implode back through each other. Otherwise they will bounce at the point where the faces are back in their original places.
  • Hidden faces are now skipped when loading a list of images with "Image→Load Image List".
  • When showing vertices close to slicing plane, ones precisely in the plane are coloured green.
  • "Color→Replace Face Color Throughout" now affects both base & dual together (if there are dual faces of the same colour). Especially useful for compounds. Works with 4D too in Stella4D.
  • Browse paths now default to more standard locations, e.g. under "My Documents\Stella" on XP.
  • Field-of-view now stored in .stel file (change using Space+Left+Right-drag).
  • Small Stella only: made "v" and "e" show hide true vertices and edges rather than virtual ones, for consistency with Great Stella and Stella4D. You can look at the folded net view to see virtual vertices/edges.
  • I believe the requirement for admin priviledges when first licensing Stella on some systems has now been removed (am unable to test this).
  • Added link to online forums under Help menu.
  • Added link to Stella facebook page under Help menu.
  • Improved quality of main icon. Won't look so chunky at larger sizes now.
  • Fixed: Small buttons on caption bar of each view didn't visibly depress. Now they push in and act on release rather than on push.
  • Fixed: Mouse wheel now works in full screen mode.
  • Fixed: Crash in rare cases when cutting an edge of a net.
  • Fixed: For Great and Small Stella, in the cross-section view, right arrow key or the yellow right arrow button didn't work. They should step to the next slice depth which passes through a vertex.
  • Fixed: Occasional inconsistency between sequence of files when stepping through them with Left/Right arrow keys.
  • Color behind icons in view titles now matches current Windows color scheme.

New in Great Stella and Stella4D only
(References to cells, hyperplanes or 4D below apply to Stella4D only)

  • Improvements to image export.
    • Can now export videos! Either AVIs or animated GIFs.
    • Animate rotation, net folding, dual morphing, and cross-section depth.
    • Export tours as videos.
    • Create seamlessly looping videos.
    • Preview controls so you can see what you'll get. Play, stop, fast forward, frame by frame, etc.
    • Select orientation of model.
    • Can now set DPI and physical dimensions for images (useful if importing to Word and for publishers).
    • Added keyboard shortcut. Just hit X for export.
  • Improvements to 3D export.
    • Export to STL format for stereolithography (3D printing).
    • Choice of orientation is now available: use current, default, look-down/sit-on axis, or look-at/sit-on vertex/face.
    • Spheres for vertices and cylinders for edges may now be exported to VRML using VRML's native support for spheres and cylinders.
    • Spheres for vertices and cylinders for edges may now be exported to all formats via approximation using additional geometry.
    • Close to correct colours now exported for DXF (chosen from DXF's limited colour palette).
    • DXF export should now know what units to use.
  • Improvements to faceting.
    Stepping through
    valid facetings
    • During facet creation, coplanar vertices are highlighted in green, others in red.
    • New "Faceting" menu.
    • Enumerate facetings according to selected criteria. New buttons to go to next/previous faceting ("previous" not yet implemented for most criteria).
    • Use up/down arrows in Faceting View to step through facetings, possible facets, or possible faceting planes.
    • Current set of facets is now saved in .stel file.
    • Creation/deletion of facets can now be undone/redone.
    • Added "Faceting→Delete All Facets".
    • New button appears in faceting mode to set a point at the centre of the model.
    • The Faceting Diagram view shows the faceting diagram for a specific vertex. This has also been improved:
      • Now also shows heavier lines for facets that have been created. They are coloured to match the facet they represent, and may be selected with Shift+Left-click.
      • For an uncluttered view, added the "Faceting→Faceting Diagram Options" submenu. It contains "Hide Diagram when Facets Exist" and "Hide Vertices when Facets Exist".
  • Improvements to zonohedra.
    A zonish polyhedron
    • Add zones to an existing polyhedra to create zonish polyhedra.
    • Choice of where to get zones from: faces, edges, vertices, symmetry axes etc (previously always from vertices).
    • Set maximum number of zones to add.
  • Improvements to symmetries.
    • Standard Schönflies symmetry group symbols and Conway orbifold notation are now displayed, with a drop-down list showing all subsymmetry groups.
    • Symmetries requiring a combination of both rotation and reflection ("Rotation-Reflection" in the reflection symmetry drop-down list) are now represented visually when reflection planes are shown. They appear as a wavy circle instead of flat, with waves matching the rotation required.
    • Central-inversion symmetry is now also represented, by a few double-headed arrows through the centre of the model.
    • Fixed: central inversion was missing as a sub-symmetry from some dihedral and pyramidal groups.
  • More improvements to built-in polyhedron browser.
    6/2.4.4 prism
    compound
    • Fixed: entering 120.4.4 and similar to create large prisms and antiprisms didn't work. Now larger numbers work, and the results are more accurate.
    • May now enter 6/2.4.4 and similar to create prism and antiprism compounds (6 and 2 have a common factor of 2, meaning that 6/2.4.4 is a compound of two 3.4.4 prisms).
    • May now enter 6/3.3.3.3 and similar to create compound antiprisms with degenerate bases.
  • Improvements to "Scale→Non-Uniform Scale".
    • Changed name to "Stretch (Non-Uniform Scale)"
    • Can now set resulting height explicitly rather than scaling by a factor (e.g. use to create an antiprism of a given height).
    • Can set resulting measured distance (e.g. use to create an antiprism with given lateral edge lengths).
    • Scale through selected vertex or along selected edge.
  • Improvements to .stel file format.
    • Current set of facets created in Faceting Mode is remembered.
    • Mouse inertia is now stored in the .stel file. That is, if you start a polyhedron rotating on its own, or morphing, or the cross-section depth is changing, these will be stored in the .stel file and the animation restored when reloaded.
    • Remembers dual-morph ratio.
    • Remembers 3D folding net ratio.
    • Remembers explosion scale (Ctrl+Shift+Left-drag).
    • Remembers cell shrink scale, in both main view and net view (Stella4D only).
  • Improvements to showing text on faces/vertices.
    New text options
    Text printed on nets
    • Text may now be applied to edges in addition to faces and vertices.
    • Text no longer needs to be aligned to the screen. For example, text may be flat on a face, stand along an edge, or extend out radially from a vertex. A host of options can be found with "Edit→Text Options...".
    • Text may span multiple lines.
    • Text on faces is now shown on folding and flattened nets, and printed on nets too. Make your own polyhedral dice with numbered sides, or make dice with your own instructions on each side.
    • Added "Edit→Remove Text..." which provides various options for removing text from faces/edges/vertices.
    • Supports some HTML including:
      • Emphasis: <b>, <i>
      • Font changes: <font color>, <font size>, <font face>
      • Lists: <ul>, <ol>, <li>
      • Formatting: <center>, <right>, <br>, <p>
      • Subscripts and superscripts: <sub>, <sup>
      • Special characters: &gt; &lt; &amp; &copy; &deg;
      • Links: <a href="link">link text</a>. Follow the link by double-clicking on it or using Shift+Left-click. The link may take the following forms:
        • Link to a website: <a href="http://www.software3d.com/Stella.php">Stella</a>
        • Send an email: <a href="mailto://Someone@domain.com">Email</a>
        • Open some random file: <a href="file://Blah.txt">Open Blah.txt</a>
        • Open a built-in model. Uses custom identifier "shape:". Note: you can use "shape://", but the "//" is optional. Name of shape can be anything you would type into the search box, and will open the first shape that would be found that way. E.g.
          <a href="shape:d">Dodecahedron</a>
          <a href="shape:cubes 5">Compound of 5 Cubes</a>
        • If file name after "file://" is recognised as a Stella file, that file will be opened within Stella. You can use this with .stel files and .tour files. Paths may be absolute, or relative to the currently open file:
          <a href="file://Shape.stel">Shape</a>
          <a href="file://Demo.tour">Take the demo tour!</a>
        • This means you could pretty much put together a polyhedral website or file browser now. Only usable inside Stella though.
        • Use the custom "noColor" to stop links from being coloured blue: <a noColor href="shape:cube">Cube</a>
    • Additional non-standard HTML tags:
      • Show a drop-shadow: <shadow>...</shadow>
      • Make text glow (sort of): <glow>...</glow>
      • Font resolution: <font res=128 face="...">
      • Indentation: <in>...</in>. Use <in> within a line of text to make subsequent lines match the indentation of what follows on that first line.
      • Display different text depending on whether a face is selected:
        <sel>Selected text<else>Unselected text</sel>
        • E.g. try this: <sel><font color=green><b>Selected<b></font><else>Unselected</sel>
        • The <else> part is optional. You may put other HTML tags inside too. You can even split bookend tags between separate <sel> tags. For example, to make text bold when a face is selected:
          <sel><b></sel>Blah!<sel></b></sel>
        • You can use this to hide links till you select a face. E.g., just make a big "+" appear when selected:
          <sel><font size=+4><a href="http://www.google.com">+</a></font></sel>
    • Added "Edit→Load Text List" and "Edit→Save Text List" submenus, allowing lines from text files to be loaded onto faces/edges/vertices. There's also an option to make this loading persistent, so when you switch to another model, the same lines of text will be loaded onto faces/edges/vertices of the new model. Hidden faces are skipped when loading a text list.
  • Equations may now be entered anywhere a real number is required, such as when setting the scale of a model. Some examples:
    • 1 / 5. A fifth, same as 0.2.
    • 3.1 + 2.5 * 3. As usual, multiplication takes place before addition.
    • (2 - 1) * (3 + 1). Brackets may be used to force operator precedence the way you want.
    • 2 ^ 7. 2 to the power of 7.
    • 2 + 1 / tau. "tau" or "g" may be used to represent the golden ratio (1.618034...). You may also use "pi" (3.14159...).
    • sqrt(2). Square root of 2. Other functions available include sin(), cos() and tan(), which expect radians as input, or their equivalents expecting degrees: sind(), cosd() and tand().
    • 1 + 3r2. "r" may be used as shorthand for sqrt(). Brackets are not required if taking the square root of a simple number. Also, multiplication is presumed when "*" is left out, so "3r2" may be used instead of "3 * r2".
  • Added "Poly→Create Torus".
  • Added "w" keyboard shortcut for creating Waterman polytopes.
  • For "Poly→Put Models on Faces", changed the "Depth to bury models in faces/vertices" option to "Height of models above faces/vertices". The value is simply negative what it was before, but I believe this is clearer.
  • Color Mode now works in stellation views too.
  • Added more options to "Display→Show Intersections with Spheres".
  • Fixed: Augmentations to multiple faces at once where some faces where blended with each augmentation could sometimes fail. If choosing to keep coincident faces, it could also crash.
  • Fixed: Couldn't create nets or stellations of polyhedra with rotation-reflection symmetry combined with faces in planes through the model's centre.
  • Fixed: Coplanar faces in hemi-planes could sometimes cause error messages.
  • Fixed: Occasional "Can't match coplanar face order" error message.
  • Fixed: Rare error where polyhedron was incorrectly thought to be one-sided.

New in Stella4D only

  • Convex hull of a set of disconnected 4D points may now be made. Points must be provided via the OFF file format, with zero for the number of faces.
  • Creation of 4D step prisms and gyrochora. Use "4D→Create Step Prism". Access gyrochora as duals of the step prisms. Gyrochora are a weird collection of 4D dice.
  • Creation of 4D Waterman polytopes.
  • New views supported in 4D: morph duals by expansion, morph duals by tilting quads.
  • Added 50 or so new scaliforms and named them all properly (thanks to Jonathan Bowers).
  • All uniform polychora are now named (previously most Idcossids and Dircospids were unnamed).
  • Fixed: Couldn't select a 4D edge when using cylinders for edges.
  • Fixed: Sometimes 4D dual cell colours were not saved in .stel file.
  • Fixed: Using Color Mode on the dual copied colors from the base instead, plus a few other bugs of this type.
Net of 7,2 Gyrochoron
(Notice all cells are alike)
Slicing a
4D Waterman
Morph by
expansion in 4D
Morph by "tilting
quads" in 4D

Older versions

 

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