Jupyter VPython 0.3.5; Binder

[Bruce Sherwood]

vpython 0.3.5 -- get it with "pip install vpython --upgrade"

John Coady modified the communications between VPython and the Jupyter notebook in vpython to compress the data at one end and expand it at the other, using zip mechanisms. The result is a big saving in communcation time. As a result, the example program RotatingBoxes runs about 2.5 times faster; on my computer it went from about 8 updates per second to over 20 per second.

0.3.5 also has some important improvements in handling mouse interactions that are coupled to changes in a canvas, as for example in the program Stonehenge. As always, you can a copy of these programs from 

    https://github.com/BruceSherwood/vpython-jupyter/blob/master/JupyterPythonDemos.zip?raw=true

Binder: Run Jupyter VPython programs without installing anything!

Binder (http://mybinder.org) permits Jupyter notebooks housed in open-source GitHub repositories to be executed without installing anything on your own computer. A grant made it possible to pay for a group of Google computers to execute the notebooks. Here is a useful overview of the project:

    http://ivory.idyll.org/blog//2016-mybinder.html

And here is a Binder version of the Jupyter VPython example programs, which you can run even on a computer that does not have Python or Jupyter installed:

    http://mybinder.org/repo/BruceSherwood/vpython-jupyter

In some case you may be told that "I couldn't find a kernel matching VPython. Please select a kernel:" You should choose the VPython option.

Because this is browser-based, programs even run on mobile devices, though on my phone sometimes the canvas was truncated. Amazing stuff.

[Bruce Sherwood]

Jupyter VPython 0.3.6: Fixes some bugs; RotatingBoxes runs MUCH faster, Stonehenge fly-through now works better.