The properties file

There is a configuration file which stores most of the properties explained in the previous section and some more. This section is devoted to these properties that are not represented in the GUI but are still configurable. The configuration file is located in $HOME/.gaiasky/global.properties. Here are some of the properties found in this file that are not represented in the GUI.

Graphics properties

  • graphics.render.time - This property gets a boolean (true|false) and indicates whether a timestamp is to be added to screenshots and frames.

Data properties

  • data.json.catalog - This property points to the json file where the catalog(s) to load are defined. The properties data.json.catalog.* contain the default catalogs which are shipped with Gaia Sky and are offered in the config dialog.

  • data.json.objects - Contains the json file where the definition of all the rest of the data is specified. There are three child properties (data.json.objects.gq.[0..2]) which contain the default graphics quality options.

  • data.limit.mag - This contains the limiting magnitude above which stars shall not be loaded.

Scene properties

  • scene.labelfactor - A real number in [0..n] that controls the number of star labels to display. The larger the number, the more stars will have a label.

  • scene.star.thresholdangle.quad - This property contains the view angle (in degrees) boundary above which the stars are rendered as quads. Quads are basically 4-vertex quadrilaterals, and they can be rendered as textures (images) or using shaders. They display more detail but are costlier in terms of GPU processing.

  • scene.star.thresholdangle.point - This property contains the view angle (in degrees) boundary above which the stars are rendered as points. Points are single pixels, so they are not very resource demanding.

  • scene.star.thresholdangle.none - This property contains the view angle (in degrees) below which the stars are not rendered at all. Usually this is 0 unless you want to cull very distant stars.

  • scene.point.alpha.min - Contains the minimum alpha value (opacity) in [0..1] for the stars rendered as points. This should in any case be lower than scene.point.alpha.max.

  • scene.point.alpha.max - Contains the maximum alpha value (opacity) in [0..1] for the stars rendered as points. This should in any case be greater than scene.point.alpha.min.

  • scene.galaxy.3d - Contains a boolean. If set to true, the Milky Way will be rendered using a blending of a 2D image with a 3D distribution of stars and nebulae. Otherwise, only the 2D image is used.

Program wide properties

  • program.tutorial - This gets a boolean (true|false) indicating whether the tutorial script should be automatically run at start up.

  • program.tutorial.script - This points to the tutorial script file.

  • program.debuginfo - If this property is set to true, some debug information will be shown at the top right of the window. This contains information such as the number of stars rendered as a quad, the number of stars rendered as a point or the frames per second. This can be activated in real time by pressing CTRL + D.

  • program.ui.theme - Specifies the GUI theme. Three themes are available: bright-blue, dark-orange, dark-green, dark-orange-large and HiDPI. If you have a HiDPI screen (retina, 4K monitor) with a large dots per inch (DPI) number, you should use the HiDPI theme. Since version 0.704b you can also choose the theme by using the User Interface tab in the Preferences dialog.