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Installation Getting DINO to run on your platform
  1. What other software/libraries are required to run DINO?
  2. How do I install it?
  3. On linux, I get an error about unresolved library libGLcore.so, whats going on?
  4. Is there / will there be a version for MSWIN?
General Issues concerning all platforms
  1. Is there a startup file?
  2. How can I place labels in the scene, especially for stereo figures ?
Rendering Issues concerning display and rendering
  1. How do I change the background color?
  2. How do I change the quality of line rendering?
  3. How do I change the quality of coordinate dataset cpk,custom,hsc and tube modes?
  4. How do I draw alpha-helices as cylinders?
  5. The beta-strands are too wiggly, I want them straight! Is this possible?
  6. How do I change the diameter of rendered coordinate objects?
Legal Matters
  1. How much does DINO cost?
  2. Can I use figures produced with DINO in publications?
Installation Getting DINO to run on your platform
  1. What other software/libraries are required to run DINO?
    DINO requires a working OpenGL implementation (libGL.so), which is usually provided. If not, then you might want to take a look at     Mesa3D. All other libraries are linked statically, providing maximum flexibility.

  2. How do I install it?
    On **ix, DINO comes as a stand-alone executable that should ideally placed into a directory pointed to by $PATH. If you downloaded a snapshot, try something like
    gunzip < dino-0.8.6-20030331.gz > dino
    chmod 755 dino
    cp dino /SOME/DIR/IN/PATH/

  3. On linux, I get an error about unresolved library libGLcore.so, whats going on?
    I am working on this bug. In the meantime, please make a symbolic link from libGL.so to libGLcore.so, e.g. (as root) 
    cd /usr/lib
ln -s libGL.so libGLcore.so

  4. Is there / will there be a version for MSWIN?
    This is planned, but work has not yet started.

General Issues concerning all platforms
  1. Is there a startup file?
    Yes, on **ix. DINO looks for a .dinorc file during startup, first in the current directory, then in $HOME. In this file, you can specify an exec block that gets executed prior to any other command, e.g.: 
    exec {
 scene set bg=white
 scene set fov=45
}

  2. How can I place labels in the scene, especially for stereo figures ?

    It is not possible to place sophisticated labels within the scene, the labels obtained by shift-clicking on an atom are not guaranteed to be written out. I recommend to use an image manipulation tool such as gimp to place labels in scene after exporting it.

    Alignment of stereo-labels is not as difficult as it may seem. the crucial point is the exact position of the left and right label on the horizontal axis (ie identical y coordinate). To achieve this, a label is placed on one side, copied, and placed in the other stereo half at the same y-coordinate and approximate x-position. In fact, it should not be the same x-position because this will remove the stereo-effect.


Rendering Issues concerning display and rendering
  1. How do I change the background color?
    scene set bg=COLOR

  2. How do I change the quality of line rendering?
    • The render flags nice/fast optimize rendering for appearance resp speed.
    • The linewidth (set by render property lw) can be a fractional number. Note however that some platforms only support antialiasing (render nice) for a linewidth of 1.0.
    • Transparency (render property t) can greatly improve line appearance, especially if many lines are displayed (e.g. for electron densities).

  3. How do I change the quality of coordinate dataset cpk,custom,hsc and tube modes?
    With the following render properties:
    • detail1: number of circular segments (per 90deg, ie setting detail1=5 will subdivide a circle into 20 line-segments)
    • detail2: the number of spline segments between control-points

  4. How do I draw alpha-helices as cylinders?
    This feature is not yet implemented (actually, it is, but not very well, use render helixm=1).

  5. The beta-strands are too wiggly, I want them straight! Is this possible?
    No, the spline-algorithm constructs the smooth backbone to pass exactly through the position of the CA carbons. This is a feature, not a bug!

  6. How do I change the diameter of rendered coordinate objects?
    mode "custom" is affected by the render properties bw (bond width) and sr (sphere radius) mode "tube" by tubew & tuber (tube width and axial ratio) mode 'hsc' by helixw & helixt (alpha helix width and thickness), strandw & strandt & arrowt (beta strand width, thickness and relativ arrow thinkness), tubew & tuber (loop width and axial ratio), baset & sugart (nucleic acid base and sugar thickness)

Legal Matters
  1. How much does DINO cost?
    DINO is freely available at no cost to educational, non-profit and profit-oriented organizations, as well as individuals, so basically to everyone.

  2. Can I use figures produced with DINO in publications?
    Yes, absolutely! Please either include a sentence of the following kind in each caption: 
    Figure produced with DINO (http://www.dino3d.org)
    or - even better - reference DINO using (many journals allows URLs as references): 
    DINO: Visualizing Structural Biology (2003)
Ansgar Philippsen
http://www.dino3d.org