Displaying electron density

[doelz at urz.unibas.ch]

In article <2383953 at mtsg.ubc.ca>, Michael_E._Murphy at MTSG.UBC.CA writes:
> 
>      I am intrested in molecular graphics software that is good at
> displaying electron density contours.  We have been using FRODO on
> our 3000 series and I would like a 4D version.  Is there anything
> better available?  Has anyone experimented with something more
> realistic than wire cages?
>  

We have been writing a prototype of program which does 
on-line contouring of density maps on a SGI 4D/120 resulting in shaded 
surfaces. Manipulation like scaling, rotation, translation 
and recontouring are done with dials. Split pair stereo 
is provided (and, StereoView will be running soon in our lab). 
The surfaces can be lighted, transparent, etc. A conversion utility
for reformatting binary CCP4 VAX data is provided. 

The performance is great, the code is spagetti. Therefore, 
we are about redesigning it and will write it in C++. 

The problem of the program is that we do not reinvent the wheel, 
thus, need to have a package with a sufficiently open interface. 
There are some choices, and we did not conclude on a final package 
yet. 

- Reinhard