fractal.exe

The client application to be used to display fractals.

mandelps.dll

A proxy DLL needed to marshal interface calls to an object residing inside a different process not necessarily on the same machine.

mandel.exe

A server application to calculate an ordinary mandelbrot set.

mandel4dim.exe

A server application to calculate a slightly changed mandelbrot set. It is using 4-dim hypercomplex numbers instead of 2-dim ordinary complex numbers.

mandel8dim.exe

A server application to calculate a slightly changed mandelbrot set. It is using 8-dim hypercomplex numbers instead of 2-dim ordinary complex numbers.

julia.exe

A server application to calculate a julia-set.

newton.exe

A server application to calculate a different kind of fractal resulting out of applying the Newton method to the nonlinear equation z^3 + 1 = 0.

expression.exe

A server application to calculate a of fractal whose equation can be entered.

register.bat

Call to register the provided servers and proxy DLLs.

unregister.bat

Call to un-register the provided servers and proxy DLLs.

readme.htm

This file.

• copy/unpack the provided files into a directory of your choice
• register the proxy DLL mandelps.dll by executing:
  regsvr32 mandelps.dll
  
  regsvr32.exe should be located inside your system directory.
• register the servers by executing:
  mandel /regserver
  mandel4dim /regserver
  mandel8dim /regserver
  julia /regserver
  newton /regserver

I tested this, using NT machines as servers and as clients. I did not test this using Windows9x.

To enable others to exploit the CPU power of your machine you have to perform the following additional tasks:

• all the points mentioned above in normal Installation for single machine use
• enabling DCOM on your machine -- I think this has to be done on the client machine as well
• start dcomcnfg
• select the "Default Properties" tab
• select "Enable Distributed COM on this computer"
• specifying who is enabled to use FractalEngine servers on your machine
• create a local group called e.g. fractal
• start user manager
• select in the main menu User-New Local Group
• give it a name (e.g. fractal)
• give it a description (e.g. members are allowed to use the fractal servers on my machine)
• add to this group the logins of the people you want to be able to use your machine -- ideally this are the people, which also allow you to use their machine in the same way. This should include you of course. Ideally this are network logins in contrary to local logins. I not test this using local logins.
• specify access permissions, launch permissions for all servers
• launch dcomcnfg
• select the applications tab
• doubleclick a FractalEngineFactory server (this has to be done for every single server)
• select the security tab
• select "Use custom access permissions" and press the matching edit button
• add the just created local group "fractal" to the access permissions
• select "Use custom launch permissions" and press the matching edit button
• add the just created local group "fractal" to the launch permissions
• repeat this for every single server

I'm sorry about all this clicking and selecting for every single server. If someone knows about a way on how to script the entire procedure, please let me know.

• Unregister all the servers and proxy dlls:
  mandel /unregserver
  mandel4dim /unregserver
  mandel8dim /unregserver
  julia /unregserver
  newton /unregserver
• unregister the proxy DLL:
  regsvr32 /u mandelps.dll
• delete the files

Of couse one can also use the provided

to do all this (except deleting).

There is a single popup menu which appears when clicking with the right mouse button into the window. It provides menu items for

• Zoom In
  Draw a zoom rectangle before. To draw a zoom rectangle press the left mouse button and keep it pressed while moving the mouse button. If you don't like the rectangle start again. This item will create a new window with the new fractal being calculated.
• Iteration methods
  Shows all registered servers. Selecting one will create a new window with this iteration method being calculated.
• Iteration method parameters
  Allows setting some parameter for the current selected iteration method. When the OK button is clicked a new window will be opened calculating the current fractal at the current coordinates with the new parameters. See parameters below.
• Save Bitmap ...
  stores the calculated bitmap to disk.
• Save and Set as Current Wallpaper...
  same "Save Bitmap", but also makes this the current wallpaper of your desktop.
• create new color set
  creates a new color palette for the bitmap
• floating colors
  toggles floating colors on or off
• bitmap size
  changes the bitmap size for a new window and all its children. This is currently quite a hack, since I did not manage to set the maximum window size for bitmaps smaller than the screen size or to introduce scroll bars for bitmaps larger than the window size. Before entering a bitmap size please consider the amount of memory needed: 5byte/pixel (3 for bitmap and 2 for number of iterations -- to be able to change the color set). And please consider that doubling the number of pixels for both dimensions does result in 4times the amount of memory needed. There is definitely some compression needed (grin). But since during calculation the memory is only accessed in small pieces at a time, the swapping is only pretty strong at the beginning and one can quite easily keep working during a fractal is being calculated in the background.
• Color function
  Allows the user to enter three functions for red, green, blue. The argument for every color function will be the color index (1…65535).
• About...
  Fetches another bottle of beer.
• Things to be done
• The user should be able to save/load coordinates/parameters.

The servers are performing their calculation with priority idle. This means, that they don't get any CPU time if there is a different process with higher priority (and higher means here normal priority) which currently consumes CPU time. Thus it may happen, that the fractal calculation is not advancing at all if you're running another application which consumes much CPU time (like a compiler or a simulator or another fractal generator). I consider such applications as not cooperative, especially if they even use normal priority in case of their window does not own the focus.

• Crash when creation of a Fractal Server object failed, e.g. because of invalid expression entered for the expression server -- fixed.
• Multiple CPUs were not used -- fixed.
• Crash when storing bitmap
• Bitmap was not initialized to zero at the beginning. This may have caused pictures containing trash before being overwritten by the calculation. This bug did only occur on Windows9x as far as I know.
• Problem on some Windows9x installations because of ATL.DLL was missing or a symbol in ATL.DLL was not available. Fixed by not using ATL anymore.
• register.bat should now find regsvr32.exe also on Windows9x systems
• zoom rectangle appeared on its own in a newly constructed window
• In case of instantiation of a server on a remote machine fails, an error message is provided in the statusbar.
• Servers will be only instantiated once in a process instead of for every window separately avoiding long waiting times for every window.
• Window will only be made visible after all the initial stuff has been done.
• Client should need considerable less CPU time. This is only important in case of using the server mode. The client should now be able to exploit some more servers.
• Only 8 bits were used to pass the number of iterations resulting in images containing only 256 colors. Furthermore the color black may have been used as a normal color but not only to indicate no convergence.