I have amassed a large collection of software available for Mac OS computers.
Most of these are shareware or freeware. Some were used to create the graphics
included in this book. Others were used for inspiration or entertainment. Recommended
programs are highlighted in yellow. Files archived on this server were compressed
using StuffIt 5.5.
 |
1D Maps. James D. Meiss. 2001.
James D. Meiss [external link]
Seven different folded mappings (logistic, cosine, cubic, exponential, tangent,
tent, and circle map). Five different ways to analyze them (cobweb, bifurcation,
lyapunov exponent, invariant density, and exit time plot). Interesting in
a limited sort of way. Also available in a version for the Classic OS. |
 |
ABC map. James D. Meiss. 2003.
James D. Meiss [external
link]
A 3D map editor. An example of what I would call an "unripened" application.
As the author himself warns, "This is NOT a full blown
nice Mac application... and
using this will possibly crash the program if you type in the wrong numbers.
USE AT YOUR OWN RISK!" I concur. |
 |
Chaotic Flows. John Lindner, Bryan Prusha, Josh
Bozeday. 2001.
CoWCPP [external link]
Explore the Chua, Duffing, Lorenz, and Rössler attractors. Zoom in
and out, rotate, and play with the parameters. Also available in a version
for the Classic OS. One of many
scientific applications for the Macintosh from the very interesting College
of Wooster Computational Physics Project. Other applications at this
site related to chaos and fractals include:
- C-Ball: Interactively explore the chaotic dynamics of a ball
bouncing between two circles.
- Chaotic Light Scattering: Infinite hall of mirrors effect involving
4 reflecting globes stacked like cannon balls.
- DLA: Simulate diffusion limited aggregation.
- Duffing: Interactively explore the phase space flow of the
famous Duffing nonlinear oscillator.
- Jerk Chaos: Phase space attractors of jerk (j = da/dt) differential
equations.
|
 |
Gerry's Attraction (formerly Gerry's Lorenz
Attractor). Gerry Beggs. 2002.
Gerry Beggs [external
link]
Start with a group of points on the xy plane, run them through the right
equations, and watch them congeal on the Lorenz Attractor or the less interesting
Rössler Attractor. Also comes with an option that allows you to fly
around the attractors while they evolve. An inspired way to view them. Much
better than fixed diagrams. Carbonized to run in both the Classic and OS X environments. |
 |
Populus. Don Alstad. 2001
Don Alstad [external link]
A comprehensive tutorial on population and evolutionary dynamics with something
like 20 different models to play with. The help files are more interesting
than the program itself, however, which hesitates in the most annoying manner.
Still has a lot of potential as a great teaching tool for undergraduate
students in this field. Also available in a version for DOS and Java. (The
OS X version is actually just a "packaged" Java application.) |
 |
StageGrow. Ian G. Gillespie. 2001.
Ian Gillespie [external link]
A program for exploring population dynamics in a single species. Very technical.
Designed for people who know what it's all about (which excludes me). Staged,
geometric, exponential, and logistic models are supported. |
 |
StdMap. James D. Meiss. 2002.
James D. Meiss [external link]
Standard map orbits in this book were drawn using the Classic
version of this program. Has other features for exploring nine different
area preserving maps. A nice piece of software with good documentation.
Fast and fun to play with, too. |
 |
AltiVec Fractal Carbon. Dauger Research. 2001.
Dauger Research [external link]
A program for testing the computing power of the G4 Velocity Engine (AltiVec)
and systems running multiple processors. Explore the standard and quartic
Mandelbrot sets. A test program with essentially no options. |
 |
Carbon Fractal. Harold Cooper. 2001.
physoft [last
known url]
carbon-fractal.sit [ 20k]
It appears as if it just draws Mandelbrot and Julia sets, but the website
claims it has additional features. It doesn't really matter as it is too
slow to be much fun. Simple programs like this one should run fast and be
intuitively obvious to operate. This one is neither. |
 |
Cheap Mandel. Conor McCarthy. 2001.
Conor McCarthy [external link]
Examine the Mandelbrot set. A beginner's attempt at programming for the
Mac. The original Classic OS version was not much better. |
|
Complex Explorer. Thomas Hallock. 2002.
Thomas Hallock [external link]
A very simple program for exploring the Mandelbrot set. Comes with a unique
color palette editor that I really like. Allows the user to save coordinates,
but not images. A version for the Classic OS apparently exists, but I've
never tested it. |
 |
Dynamics. Richard Koch, Pierre d'Herbemont. 2001.
Richard Koch [external link]
A very basic fractal set explorer. Zoom and pan around a colored Mandelbrot
set in the main window. View the associated black and white Julia set in
a side window. A bit slow, given all the speed claims for OS X native
applications. |
 |
EasyFractal. Berkhan Software. 2003.
Berkhan Software [external link]
Zoom into the Mandelbrot set, check out the corresponding Julia set, play
with the colors, try a different function. Comes with a collection of preset
parameter files, some of which are interesting and rather unusual. Available
in German and English versions for both the Classic OS and OS X. |
 |
EDFractal. Edward Baskerville, ED Development. 2001.
ED Development [last
known url]
edfractal.sit [ 117k]
The first chaos/fractal application written for OS X that I found.
Explore the Mandelbrot set. Create Julia sets and explore them, too. A very
straightforward example of programming. |
 |
Fractal Domains (formerly FracPPC). Dennis C.
De Mars. 1994-2002.
Fractal Domains [external link]
Explore the Mandelbrot set. Switch to the accompanying Julia set. Zooming
in and out is rather tiresome, but otherwise this is a fine application.
The switch from the Classic version to OS X
has brought about a much improved look and feel. |
|
Fractale de Julia, Fractale de Mandelbrojt (a.k.a. Fracatle
Julia, Fracatle Mandel), Didier Straus, 2002.
Software-DS [external link]
Student programming projects that don't work. Draws a filled Julia or
Mandelbrot set, then quits (or never completes the startup process). These
application should not have been made public. They are effectively
locked in an alpha phase of arrested development. |
 |
Gaston. Leo Fink. 2003.
gaston.sit [ 115k]
A nice little program that renders three dimensional cross sections of
quaternion Julia sets. A quaternion is a type of complex number with four
parts (r, i, j, and k) rather than two (real and imaginary).
Adjust all four parts of the quaternion constant with sliders. Try different
escape radii until
you
find an
interesting looking surface and export it as a TIFF. Also has sliders for
adjusting the precision and resolution. Given the complexity of quaternion
mathematics,
you will want to keep the resolution low during casual exploration. High
quality images are rendered very slowly. My only complaint is that
the sliders are somewhat crude and hard to adjust finely. There should
be
some method
for
enetring
the constant values directly. |
|
Mandel Blot. Nixanz. 2002.
nixanz.com [external link]
Amateur night at the Mac. Draw and explore the Mandelbrot set. Drag to zoom
in, poof, the image window disappears, poof, the image window reappears
with your new image. Very simple color options: your choice of red, green,
blue, cyan, magenta, or yellow with varying brightness and contrast. Note
how the author has chosen to hide behind a screen name. |
 |
Mandelbrot. Christoph Lauer. 2002.
Christoph Lauer [external link]
A painfully slow Java program for exploring the Mandelbrot set and rendering
corresponding Julia sets. Java is not the right environment for applications
that require intensive calculation. Also available for Linux and Windows. |
 |
Mandelbrot. David Ross. 2001.
David Ross [external link]
An easily forgettable program. Draw and explore Mandelbrot sets from order
2 through 59. This may sound impressive but really isn't. Very high order
Mandelbrot sets all look like circles. Switch over to the Julia set associated
with a particular location of the Mandelbrot set. Very simple and plain
color schemes. |
 |
Mandelbrot Viewer (a.k.a. Custom View). Michael C Thornburgh. 2001.
Mr. Mike [external link]
A good basic Mandelbrot explorer. Simple and fast with very few options.
Zoom in, but not out. Adjust the escape radius, number of iterations, number of threads
(not quite sure what that means), and location of the origin (which renders
distorted Mandelbrot-Julia hybrids), but not the color scheme. |
 |
PhoenIX. Adrian Platts. 2001.
Adrian Platts [external link]
Deliberately styled interface with options, options, options. Auto zooms,
generates relief maps, makes movies, plays background MIDI and MP3 files,
and acts as a screen saver. It also draws several kinds of Mandelbrot and
Julia sets. Comes with yet more options that I haven't described. Also available
in a version for the Classic OS. |
|
TransWorld (a.k.a. WindowFreak). Junzo Sato. 2001.
Junzo Sato [external link]
A waste of time. Very slowly renders a very low resolution image of the
full Mandelbrot set or one specific Julia set in a transparent window.
No zooming. No variations of any sort other than the transparency level (thus
the name TransWorld). A "look what I can do" application
that is of interest to no one. |
 |
Cellular. Christian Grunenberg. 2001.
Christian Grunenberg [external link]
A program essentially designed to investigate cellular automata that also
happens to draw Mandelbrot sets and model galactic collisions. Not bad,
but nothing special. |
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Escape (a.k.a. EscapePPC). Graham Anderson. 2002.
EscapePPC [external link]
A comprehensive application for exploring over 20 different types of fractal
images and strange attractors. Unregistered versions can only render Mandelbrot
sets, however. Many, many features to explore for those with a serious interest.
Carbonized to run in both the Classic and OS X
environments. (Not to be confused with EscapeFractals: a Newton's Method
application for the Classic OS.) |
 |
Gerry's Mandelbrot Set. Gerry Beggs. 1998.
Gerry Beggs [last
known url]
More than just the Mandelbrot set, it also creates Julia sets, IFS images,
a fractal tree, the Lorenz attractor, bifurcation diagrams, Newton's method,
and Martin's mapping (a.k.a. hopalong). Gives you the ability to check out
a lot of different fractals using just one application. Very fast. Also
available in a version for the Classic OS. |
|
Cocoa/CarbonWatch. Anticipated new programs.
|
 |
Apfelmaennle, Huepfer. Heiko Kretschmer. 2002.
wurst-wasser.net [external link]
Apfelmaennle draws the whole Mandelbrot set, selects a region, and then
magnifies it. Selects a subregion and magnifies that. Keeps going and going.
I've never run it long enough to see it run out of steps, but eventually
it must. According to the author, Huepfer is "One more screensaver
displaying fractal-like graphics known as Hopper or Hüpfer." He
does not explain what this is, however, nor have I ever heard of it before.
Sometimes it looks like a diffusion pattern, sometimes like a checkerboard.
Apfelmaennle is the better of the two programs. |
|
Coral, Flame, Hopalong, ifs. Tommaso Pecorella.
2001, 2002.
Uselesssoft [external link]
Open source Unix programs written in the late '80s and early '90s transformed
into screen savers for OS X. Coral fills the screen with DLA
(diffusion limited aggregation) fractals that look something like corals
when shaded in. Flame draws "weird cosmic fractals" (whatever those are).
Hopalong draws the scribbly fractal of the same name plus Martin's
Method, Renaldo Recuerdo (called RR), and EJK fractals (whatever those
are). ifs draws an iterated function system that evolves smoothly over
time. The latest addition to this group, ifs is by far the best. Using
Hopalong to save your screen seems risky as it renders images
that stay static on the screen for long periods. |
 |
Fracture. Stick Software. 2001.
Stick Software [external link]
A screensaver for OS X that creates a wide variety of fractal images:
Mandelbrot set, Julia sets, Newton's and Halley's root approximation method,
etc. Pleasant color schemes and rendering techniques. Interesting yet innocuous,
which is what a good screensaver should be. |
|
Hénon. Marco Coïsson. 2003.
Marco Coïsson [external link]
This screensaver gives a graphical representation of the so-called Hénon
correlations. Simple and uneventful. Available in English and Italian versions. |
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IFS3D. David Leppik. 2001.
David Leppik [external link]
Flies over and around an evolving IFS fractal, but I don't like the way
it looks. The animation isn't smooth and the images are unnaturally dim. |
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Sierpinski 3D. Epicware. 2001.
Epicware [external link]
Screensaver of a flying, tumbling Sierpinski pyramid. Part of an Open GL
bundle of OS X screensavers. |
|
Xeverywhere. Stéphane Sudre. 2000-2002
White Box [external link]
Start with a cube, replaced it with smaller cubes, replace the smaller cubes
with even smaller cubes, and so on, then work backward. Comes with a warning
not to set the number of iterations too high. Take it seriously or the Xeverywhere
will seize control of your CPU. |
