Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What is the base-data package?

The base-data package is required for Gaia Sky to run and contains basically the Solar System data (textures, models, orbits and attitudes of planets, moons, satellites, etc.). You can’t run Gaia Sky without the base-data package.

Q: Why do you have two different download pages?

We list the most important downloads in the official webpage of Gaia Sky (here) for convenience. The server listing (here) provides access to current and old releases.

At the end of the day, if you use the download manager of Gaia Sky, you will never see any of these. If you want to download the data manually, you can do so using either page.

Q: Why so many Gaia-DR catalogs?

We offer several different catalogs based on the latest Gaia data release. Only one should be used at a time, as they are different subsets of the same data, meaning that smaller catalogs are contained in larger catalogs. For exmaple, the stars in edr3-default are contained in edr3-large. We offer so many to give the opportunity to explore the Gaia data to everyone. Even if you have a low-end PC, or don’t have lots of disk space to spare, you can still run Gaia Sky with the smaller subsets, which only contain the best stars in terms of parallax relative error. If you have a more capable machine, you can explore larger and larger slices and get more stars in.

Q: Gaia Sky crashes at start-up, what to do?

First, make sure that your drivers are up to date and your graphics card supports OpenGL 3.2 and GLSL 3.3.

Some startup crashes are due to inconsistencies in the data. Usually, removing the data folder (~/.local/share/gaiasky/data on Linux, %userprofile%\.gaiasky\data on Windows, ~/.gaiasky/data on macOS) solves the problem. When Gaia Sky starts again, the download manager pops up for you to redownload the data.

Another, more sophisticated way of doing it is to launch Gaia Sky forcing the download manager,

$  gaiasky -d

and then deleting and re-downloading each dataset from there, starting by the default-data pack.

If that fails, try removing the configuration file (~/.config/gaiasky/global.properties on Linux, %userprofile%\.gaiasky\global.properties on Windows, ~/.gaiasky/global.properties on macOS) and starting Gaia Sky again.

Getting a crash log

If the crash remains, we need a log. If you are using version 2.2.0 or newer, or the development version on the master branch, crash reports are saved in ~/.local/share/gaiasky/crashreports (Linux) or ~/.gaiasky/crashreports (Windows and macOS). Files starting with gaiasky_crash_* are crash reports, while files starting with gaiasky_log_* are full logs. Send us the relevant files.

If you are using another version of Gaia Sky (2.1.7 or older), getting a log differs depending on your Operating System.

On Linux, just run Gaia Sky from the command line and copy the log.

On Windows, files named output.log and error.log should be created in the installation folder of Gaia Sky. Check if they exist and, if so, attach them to the bug report. Otherwise, just open Power Shell, navigate to the installation folder and run the gaiasky.cmd script. The log will be printed in the Power Shell window.

On macOS, open a Terminal window and write this:

$  cd /Applications/Gaia\ Sky.app/Contenst/java/app
$  chmod u+x ./gaiasky
$  ./gaiasky

This will launch Gaia Sky in the terminal. Copy the log and paste it in the bug report. Here is a video demonstrating how to do this on macOS.

Once you have a log, create a bug report here, attach the log, and we’ll get to it ASAP.

Q: I’m running out of memory, what to do?

Don’t fret. Check out the maximum heap space section to learn how to increase the maximum heap memory allocated to Gaia Sky. If you computer does not have enough physical RAM, try using a smaller dataset.

Q: I can’t see the elevation data on Earth or other planets!

First, make sure you are using at least version 2.2.0. Then, make sure that your graphics card supports tessellation (OpenGL 4.x). Then, download the High-resolution texture pack using the download manager and select High or Ultra in graphics quality. This is not strictly necessary, but it is much better to use higher resolution data if possible. Finally, select Tessellation in the “Elevation representation” drop-down of the graphics pane in the settings window. See Elevation representation.

Q: What is the internal reference system used in Gaia Sky?

The reference system is described in Internal reference system. The internal workings of Gaia Sky are described in this paper.

Q: Can I contribute?

Yes. You can contribute translations (currently EN, DE, CA, FR, SK, ES are available) or code. Please, have a look at the contributing guidelines.

Q: I like Gaia Sky so much, can I donate to contribute to the project?

Thanks, but no.