Show HN: An animated graphing calculator implemented in a pixel shader

https://fofpx.com/?pid=graphingcalculator

by CarterFeldman • 6 years ago

30 13 6 years ago

fofpx.com

dag11• 6 years ago

This is cool! The Y axis seems flipped, however.

blt• 6 years ago

yes, I get this too.

ecaradec• 6 years ago

It's interesting how different solving issues in a pixel sharer is.

murgindrag5• 6 years ago

Neat!

Some context would be helpful. Is this a commercial product? Open source? For kids? For adults? I'm not quite sure what I'm looking at, except that I've got a neat thing to do with my kid that will take up a few hours, at least, and a superior competitor to Desmos for kids who like coding.

Assuming it's up tomorrow, not behind a $10,000 paywall, etc. That's why context would be helpful.

Seems similar to p5.js in spirit, but focused on a different type of problem. With p5.js, I can build from what I wrote, and toss it up on my own web site.

speps• 6 years ago

Why the extensive questioning? It's really just an example of how to do a graph in a pixel shader using the https://fofpx.com platform. It seems to be similar to ShaderToy but with a different language (JS).

murgindrag5• 6 years ago

Because:

1) I think what's being shown IS the fofpx.com platform. This platform has four demos, of which this is one. The others look neat too!

2) The platform looks awesome, and I'd like to use it myself for things I'm doing with kids learning math.

3) To do that, I'd need to have some basic, minimal background. For example, if I plan an activity for next week, will the web page still be up and work the same? Without that, it's not really practical to use.

4) The point of a Show HN is exactly to solicit feedback. I think any serious potential user would have the same sorts of questions. Tossing an FAQ or similar up of fofpx.com would be quick-and-easy.

5) The next step beyond that would be accounts, so people can save their work and come back to it.

bzb4• 6 years ago

Webm is not compatible with iPhone. Can’t you make it output standard mp4 files?

murgindrag5• 6 years ago

Animated GIFs are supported by iPhone. This outputs animated gifs. Animated gifs are the standard cross-platform format.

webm is no less standard than mp4. The battle of webm versus ogg versus mp4 (which refers to h.263 and successors) is mostly a question of technical communities (and Apple versus Google versus Firefox). Each platform supports their own subset, based on what they value. At this point, as far as marketshare, Chrome is in the lead.

Apple is throwing its weight behind mp4/h.263 mostly to keep open standards from raining on their proprietary, closed garden. There's no technical reason for it.

Most of my pages have videos transcoded to all three, but I think if they're going to output just one, webm is probably the best format to go with. Most users won't download all three; they'll download one and share it. For that, webm is the right choice. Otherwise, you'll run into more problems when Apple users try to share patent-encumbered MP4 files and have others not be able to view them. Outside animated gifs, someone needs to break; might as well be iPhone.

If you have a problem with that, complain to Apple; they could include webm and off cost-free. They choose to strip it out in order to screw you over.

leephillips• 6 years ago

This is eye-opening. I just checked webm on caniuse, and it is fully supported in all major browsers—except Safari.

cstrahan• 6 years ago

The reasoning I've seen for iOS/Safari not supporting webm: there isn't hardware support on the iPhone, which would hurt battery life. See: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16319651

However, I think that would be poor judgement on Apple's part. I mean, sure, preventing someone from watching a webm might preserve battery life, but why stop there: imagine the savings if they were to strip iOS down to merely being able to make phone calls!

Let the user consume whatever media they want, and if that media drains battery, that's on the user for making that choice. I can see that Apple wouldn't want people to complain about iPhone battery life if webm took over the web, but then I wouldn't mind some minor nag at the beginning of playback to the effect of "hey, this video you're playing may drain your battery faster than you might otherwise expect, so take it up with whoever is serving this content to provide an alternative encoding for iOS".

Show HN: An animated graphing calculator implemented in a pixel shader

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