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 OS X. |
 |
1-D Chaos Explorer. Matthew Hall. 1992.
1-d-chaos-explorer.sit [ 89k]
Bifurcation diagrams, web diagrams, time series, etc. Program your own functions
for exploration. This is a good program for those who want to understand
the basic behavior of iterated systems. Many of the web and bifurcation
diagrams in this book were rendered with this program. |
 |
Bifurcation. Ronald T. Kneusel. 1995.
bifurcation.sit [ 11k]
Faster than 1-D Chaos Explorer, but does half as much (bifurcation, and
time-series only). |
 |
Bouncing Ball. T. Abbott, N. B. Tufillaro, J. P. Reilly. 1993.
bouncing-ball.sit [ 103k]
Do you find the quadratic map too abstract and the logistic function an
oversimplification? Steady state, periodic, and chaotic phase space orbits
can all be illustrated by a ball bouncing on a vertically oscillating table.
It's a great physical application, but I find the program hard to work with
and slow. There are too many windows and too many options. It will take
some effort to master all of them, so beware. One of the authors has a page
describing the program, but it is no longer available for download.
This program and Quadratic Map (see below) go with the book An Experimental
Approach to Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos, the entire contents of which
are online in html
or pdf format. |
 |
ChaosPlot. Jason Regier. 1994.
chaosplot.sit [ 24k]
Orbit diagrams for continuous systems. Plots the behavior of a damped, driven,
anharmonic oscillator. Generates a chaotic path reminiscent of the shadow
of a fly on a wall. |
 |
Chaotic Flows. John Lindner, Bryan Prusha, Josh
Bozeday. 1997.
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 OS X. 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:
- Celestial Chaos: Illustrates chaos in the restricted 3-body
problems by simulating an asteroid moving in the gravitational field
of a binary star system.
- Chaotic Sphere: Interactively explore the spatiotemporal nonlinear
dynamics of a sphere of coupled bistable oscillators.
- Grid: Interactively explore the spatiotemporal nonlinear dynamics
of a grid of coupled bistable oscillators.
- Pendulum: Explore the dynamics of a nonlinear pendulum.
|
|
Cliff's World. John B. Matthews, Gem City Software. 1992.
cliffs-world.sit [ 22k]
Iterates Dr. Cliff Pickover's dynamical system and plots the resulting coordinate
pairs. |
 |
Cycle Explorer. James C. Burgess. 1995.
Jim Burgess [external link]
Click on the bifurcation diagram and draw the corresponding web diagram.
Move the parabola around on the web diagram and see the corresponding location
on the bifurcation diagram. Very limited interface with a wise guy attitude.
Pulling down the "Options" menu gets "No Options" as
a reply. |
 |
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. |
 |
Intelligent Chaos, Intelligent Mandelbrot, HyperKaos.
Fabian Lidman. 1998.
Fabian Lidman [external link]
Applications for viewing the behavior of actual numbers. Like a programmable
calculator, but faster. Intelligent Chaos iterates the logistic function
in the real numbers. Intelligent Mandelbrot iterates the quadratic map in
the complex numbers. HyperKaos is a discontinued HyperCard version of Intelligent
Chaos. |
 |
Orbit. Stephen Eubank, University of Texas, Austin. 1986.
orbit.sit [ 63k]
Investigate a variety of well-known one dimensional oscillators and two
dimensional discrete maps. Requires a lot of pampering to get it to work
on a PPC machine. (Note the copyright date.) |
 |
Quadratic Map. T. Abbott, N. B. Tufillaro, J. P. Reilly. 1993.
quadratic-map.sit [ 81k]
Draws time-series, bifurcation diagrams (in color), and phase space diagrams
(which are not very useful as far as I'm concerned). Users can't enter their
own functions. There are menu items for adding sound, but they don't do
anything on my machine. One of the authors has a page
describing the program, but it is no longer available for download.
This program and Bouncing Ball (see above) go with the book An Experimental
Approach to Nonlinear Dynamics and Chaos, the entire contents of which
are online in html
or pdf format. |
 |
StdMap. James D. Meiss, University of Colorado.
1994-2000.
James D. Meiss [external link]
Standard map orbits were drawn using this program. Has other features for
exploring nine different area preserving maps. A nice piece of software
with good documentation. Fun to play with, too. Also available in a version
for OS X. |
 |
3D-LParser. David H. Goeb. 2000.
David H. Goeb [last
known url]
3d-lparser.sit [ 752k]
Creates 3D files from L-System instruction files. Requires too much effort
to learn (a problem typical of 3D programs). Based on Lparser
by Laurens Lapre. |
 |
Fractal Trees. Simon Woodside. 1997.
Simon Woodside [external link]
fractal-trees.sit [ 39k]
Draws simple stick figure, fractal trees. The original, Classic version
is an exceptionally unfriendly program with no user interface. None! Its
parameters can only be modified by editing the source code. The version
for OS X is orders of magnitude better,
however. |
|
KochToy. Jim Burgess. 2001.
Jim Burgess [external link]
A conceptual, non mathematical program. Rearrange the generator with your
mouse and see the effect on the fractal simultaneously. No dialog boxes.
No numerical parameters to enter. No programming language to learn. L-Systems
reduced to their essence. |
 |
L-Systems, 3D L-System. Paul Bourke. 1991.
Paul Bourke [external link]
Draws recursively defined fractals like the Peano monster, Koch coastline,
Sierpinski gasket, and many others that look like plants or corals. The
L-System Manual
is worth reading for its own sake. Also available in a 3D version. |
 |
Line Fractal. Gabriel Nivasch. 1999.
Gabriel Nivasch [external link]
Renders over a dozen different IFS fractals including the usual -- Koch
coastline, Sierpinski triangle, etc. Has two basic features: run through
the iterations step-by-step or zoom in. The second feature is surprisingly
fast at times. |
|
LParser. Nick Porcino. 1998.
Nick Porcino [external link]
I was able to get it to render a few 3D images, but I don't really know
how this program works or what it does. LParser is too specialized for a
generalist like myself. Based on Lparser
by Laurens Lapre. |
 |
LSystems. Bryan Horling. 1996.
Bryan Horling
Renders fractals from simple recursion instructions. Colorful and visually
appealing. The author has also written a nice, compact paper on branching
systems in nature (plants, corals, etc.). |
|
pfg (Plant and Fractal Generator). Przemyslaw Prusinkiewicz. 1988-92.
University of Calgary [external link]
Draws fractal images and plant-like branching structures using L-systems
with "turtle interpretation". Fast, but difficult to work with.
No options. No interface for producing your own parameter sets (must be
coded by hand using a text editor). The author
has a home page, but the only way to acquire this program is through an
obscure ftp site. |
 |
Aros Fractals. Aros Magic Research. 1996.
Aros Magic Research [external link]
Mandelbrot set, Newton's method, and a third fractal type I've never seen
before that looks something like a moire pattern. Zoom in, but not out.
Animated colors. Unusual interface with limited options. Also available
in a Windows version. |
 |
CFG (ColorFractalGenerator). John Schlack. 1990-95.
cfg.sit [ 585k]
Mandelbrot sets, Julia sets, random walk, etc. A basic rendering program
for drawing color fractals. Unregistered versions aren't PPC native and
run slowly. |
 |
Cheap Mandel. Conor McCarthy. 2001.
Conor McCarthy [external link]
Examine the Mandelbrot set. A beginner's attempt at programming for the
Mac. The version for OS X is not much better. |
 |
EasyFract. Alessandro Guzzini. 1997.
easyfract.sit [ 100k
-- English]
easyfractals.bin
[external link -- Italiano]
Easy, yes, but there are better programs out there. Zoom into the Mandelbrot
set, play with the colors, but that's all. Available in English and Italian
versions. |
 |
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. |
 |
f_zoom. Andreas Warnke. 1996.
f-zoom.sit [ 31k]
"Zoom in die Mandelbrotmenge." A cute little nothing of a program
for zooming into the Mandelbrot set. A rare piece of überminimalism
from Germany. According to the AltaVista
Translator, "Zoom in die Mandelbrotmenge" means "Zoom
shot into the almond bread quantity."
|
 |
Floating Fractals. Adam Smith. 1994.
floating-fractals.sit [ 146k]
Zoom in and explore 11 different fractals (half of them are variations on
the Mandelbrot set). Fast and easy to use. |
 |
Fractal (a.k.a. Fractal Generation Program). Cathy &
Tom Saxton. 1999.
Tom & Cathy Saxton [external link]
Idle Loop Software [external link]
A nice simple program. Draw the Mandelbrot set. Zoom in a step at a time.
Draw the Julia set associated with a point in the Mandelbrot set. Zoom into
that a step at a time. Also available in a version for Windows. (Not to
be confused with Fractal Generation by Laurent Thil listed below under Miscellaneous). |
 |
Fractal Artist. Alexei Lebedev, Phronesis Software. 1992.
fractal-artist.sit [ 30k]
Another Julia-Mandelbrot explorer. An obscure program I found in a Japanese
archive of the comp.binaries.mac newsgroup.
|
 |
Fractal Domains (formerly FracPPC). Dennis C. De Mars. 1994-2000.
Fractal Domains [external link]
Explore the Mandelbrot set. Switch to the accompanying Julia set. Rather
plain interface with lots of control panels floating around. The version
for OS X is much nicer. FracPPC was the original,
very compact freeware version. |
 |
Fractal Observatory. Marcio Luis Teixeira, Trilobyte Software.
1990.
fractal-observatory.sit [ 11k]
Another program that doesn't use the Mac interface. Halftone grays meant
to be viewed on a black and white monitor. Looks and behaves like Super
MANDELZOOM. |
 |
Fractastic! Jake Olevsky. 1998.
Jake Olevsky [external link]
A nice piece of fractal eye candy. Draws eighteen different fractals including
Hénon attractors, Julia sets, Newton's method, and Mandelbrot sets
up to the sixth power and does it fast. Includes dynamic zooming and numerous
coloring methods with crazy-fast animation as an option. |
 |
Jason's Fractal Generator. Jason's Geeky Software. 2000.
Jason
Woofenden [external link]
Draws Mandelbrot and Julia sets. Quite fast despite permanently operating
in full screen mode. Registered versions can render movies of Julia set
cascades and Mandelbrot zooms. Only one color scheme. A
version for OS X is reportedly in the works. |
 |
JavaQuat. Garr Lystad. 2000.
Garr Lystad [external link]
A Java applet for exploring Mandelbrot sets, Julia sets, and the sets in
between. Uses quaternions (complex-complex numbers of four real parameters).
Stretch your visualization muscles as you view two-dimensional slices through
the four-dimensional mother of all sets. Oversized interface makes it hard
to work with on smaller monitors. |
 |
JLB's Dirty Mandelbrot. Jean-Luc Brousseau. 1998.
jlbs-dirty-mandelbrot.sit
[ 11k]
Somebody's weekend project. A decent job for two days work, but nothing
special. |
 |
Julia O' Matic, newer.JOM. Jim Burgess. 2001.
Jim Burgess [external link]
A split window Julia-Mandelbrot explorer. Click on the Mandelbrot set on
the right and see the accompanying Julia set on the left. Then zoom into
either set. A minimal program with few options and documentation that's
a little hard to find. A version that draws higher order sets, called newer.JOM,
appeared one day at xahlee.org and is still
there. (Some versions have the apostrophe on the wrong side of the O.) |
 |
Julia! Julie Mitchell. 1993.
julia.sit [ 35k]
Another Julia-Mandelbrot explorer. Not fast or sophisticated. In fact, it's
downright slow. Interlaced graphics and minimal options. There are better
programs available. |
 |
Julia's Dream. Reinoud Lamberts. 1991.
julias-dream.sit [ 51k]
Many of the Julia sets in this book were drawn using this program. Generates
real-time images of Julia sets as you roam around the complex plane with
your cursor. The author's
home page from 1996 still exists, but it doesn't mention the program.
(Julia's Dream was also the name of a pizza: basil pesto, ricotta and mozzarella,
topped with garlic, broccoli, and spinach. $9.99 for a 12" pie. According
to a now defunct web page, anyway .) |
 |
Julia's Nightmare. Ben Davenport. 1995.
julias-nightmare.sit [ 43k]
A full-color sequel to Julia's Dream. I have nothing else to say about this
program. |
 |
MandelBrain. Danny Brewer. 1995.
mandelbrain.sit [ 652k]
Explore the Mandelbrot set. Comes with more preset color palettes than any
other program so far. |
 |
MandelBrowser, Mandella, MicroMandella. Jesse
Jones. 1995.
mandelbrowser.sit [ 1.9M]
Mandelbrot sets, Julia sets, Newton's method, and a few others. Over 50
different sets and numerous color schemes. Fast, PPC native code. Mandella
is an older 68k version that also draws strange attractors. MicroMandella
is a stripped-down version that requires an FPU. Mandella was once sold
with a book (now out of print) called Fractals for the Macintosh
published by Waite Group Press (now a part of Macmillan Computer Publishing). |
 |
MandelMovie. Shinichiro Hirama. 2001.
Shinichiro Hirama [last
known url]
mandelmovie-hirama.sit [ 134k]
Roam around the Mandelbrot set until you find a region of interest, then
create a QuickTime movie that zooms into that spot. Available in Japanese
and English. |
 |
MandelMovie. Michael Larsen, Dynamic Software. 1995.
Dynamic
Software [external link] Description only. Program
not available online.
The Mandelbrot-Julia hybrid and Julia cascade movies in this book were rendered
in 1992 at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, School of Education using
this commercial program. Haven't used it since, so I can't comment on it.
Dynamic Software claims to offer other
chaos and fractal programs, but sending them any money seems risky. Some
of my favorite pages on their website include: a calendar of upcoming events
dated 1995, an on-line book composed entirely of broken links, and a grossly
overpriced $500 program designed when Macs ran on System 7. Crazy backgrounds
render some pages unreadable. |
 |
MandelNet. Christoph Pfisterer. 1996.
mandelnet.sit [ 111k]
Draw Mandelbrot sets using the combined power of several computers on an
AppleTalk network. Set up master and slave applications on your network.
Link the master to the slaves and away you go. Very simple to set up and
use, but completely unnecessary. Can only draw one simple, small Mandelbrot
set that does not require massive parallel processing power. Still, it's
a pretty neat idea. |
 |
MandelZot. David Platt, Think Technologies. 1998.
David Platt [external link]
Most of the Mandelbrot sets and some of the Julia sets in this book were
drawn using this program. I have been using it since 1991 so I'm used to
it. Apparently, a commercial version called FractalMagic is also available
from Sintar Software, but I can't confirm any of this. Comes with extensions
for drawing Lyapunov space images that I can't get to work. |
 |
MandleAcid. Derek Greenberg, The Bone Factory.
1993.
mandleacid.sit [ 1.0M]
"A video drug for the Macintosh." Eye candy, pure and simple.
Way cool, but useless for those interested in mathematics. No theory behind
what you're looking at. Version 2.0 is orders of magnitude faster than 1.0,
comes with a great wacky interface, and will completely coat even the largest
monitor with psychedelic glop. I really like this program, but it should
be spelled "MandelAcid".
|
 |
Object Mandelbrot. Bryan Prusha. 1996.
object-mandelbrot.sit [ 85k]
Zoom into the Mandelbrot set, draw the corresponding Julia set. Fantastically
fast with dynamic zooming. Hold down the mouse and zoom away. Keep zooming
until you reach the limits of your computer's numeric resolution. |
 |
Phoenix Adrian Platts. no date.
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. A
version for OS X is reportedly in the works. |
 |
PowerXplorer. Allesandro Levi Montalcini. 1996.
Alessandro Levi Montalcini [external link]
Bare bones simple. No interface, no documentation, no options. Draw a box
around the region you want to explore and let go. PowerExplorer zooms you
in. Intended primarily for testing computing speed. Has a bug that replaces
the menu bar with a blank region in full screen mode. Also available in
a Japanese version. |
|
RatioJulia. Christoph Stroh. 1998.
Christoph
Stroh [external link]
Draws Julia sets of rational functions. A unique program that is difficult
to use. Has a combination command-line, menu-driven interface. Not much
fun. |
 |
Super MANDELZOOM. Robert P. Manufo. 1988.
super-mandelzoom.sit [ 53k]
An antique. Meant to be viewed on a Mac SE or thereabouts. Uses halftones
instead of grays. It's been a long time, but the author
is still out there working on fractals
and whatnot. |
 |
TurboMandel. Silverware Software, Ross Anderson. 1999.
Ross Anderson [external link]
A nice, simple Mandelbrot set viewer. Zoom in and out, pan, change color
schemes, and take snapshots of your favorite scenes. That's pretty much
it. The author's website is horribly polluted with pop up ads. Think twice
before you visit it. |
 |
XaoS Fractal Zoomer. Jan Hubicka. 1997.
xaos.theory.org [external link]
Mandelbrot sets of powers 2-6. Zoom in dynamically, then switch to the Julia
set at the same level of magnification and the same point. Nice for showing
the quasi-self-similarity between the two sets. Other fractals included:
octal, Newton's method, Barnsley, and Phoenix. Comes with a really neat
option that remaps the complex plane. Very fast, optimized code that doesn't
try to redraw the entire window. Intentionally ugly interface takes some
getting used to, however. Available for nearly every platform: Amiga, BeOS,
DOS, Linux, Mac OS, OS/2, and even Windows (or so they claim). |
 |
Carpet. Kevin Whitley, Think Technologies. 1987-88.
carpet.sit [ 72k]
A simple program for stamping carpet or gasket fractals. Ancient, but it
still runs. Comes with a severely damaged tutorial file, however. |
 |
ChaosGame, SnowCrystal. K. Hirai. 1997.
K. Hirai [external link]
Two small programs that use some sort of recursive action to generate what
appear to be fractal images. The user interface is a set of chords of varying
thickness on a pair of circles: x and y. (SnowCrystal has three circles:
i, j, and k.) Moving the chords around the circle transforms the image.
Anything beyond that is a mystery to me as the user manual is written in
Japanese. |
 |
Chaos Under Control.
Brian S. Macherone. 1994.
Fractal Geometry Summer
Workshop [external link]
Found this obscure suite of applications in the class notes for an August
2000 workshop at Yale University, taught by, of all people, Benoit Mandelbrot
(the father of fractals) and Michael Frame (coauthor of Chaos Under Control,
a book on chaos, fractals, and cellular automata for nonscientists). Included
with the notes was the software to accompany Frame's book. All five applications
are creaky and slow, which obscures their utility as learning tools. They
are also a bit hard to appreciate when removed from the context of this
one particular class.
- Cellabration: one- and two-dimensional cellular automata.
- DesperatelySeekingChaos: data analysis by driven IFS, near
returns, Kelly plots, and music.
- IterateAgainSam: one-dimensional dynamics, graphical iteration,
histograms, time series, and bifurcation diagrams.
- TreenessEmerging: iterated function systems, deterministic
and random algorithms, chaos game.
- WaitingForMandelbrot: Mandelbrot and Julia sets.
|
| ? |
Cubic Oscillator Explorer. Bruno Degazio. 1995.
University
of Stuttgart [last known url]
Can't download it for review. "Communications
exception (-244)." Would someone out there send me a copy? |
 |
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.) |
 |
Fractal. Paul Bourke. No date.
Paul Bourke [external link]
This program renders a diverse array of fractal objects: the Mandelbrot
set, Julia sets, Newton's method, diffusion patterns, Hénon orbits,
several strange attractors, plus a few more. Does a good job drawing strange
attractors. (Allows you to play around with the parameter values and see
what changes.) Does a poor job drawing the Mandelbrot set. (It's slow and
ugly.) Has a strange quirk to it that I found annoying: accessing the menu
bar wipes out the display's memory and starts the rendering process over
from the beginning. |
 |
Fractal Explorer. Peter Stone. 1999.
Peter Stone [external link]
Easily the largest collection of preset fractals: Mandelbrot sets, Julia
sets, escape fractals, Newton's method, quaternions, and others. Enter your
own complex functions and see what happens. Fairly fast, but the interface
is too clumsy for this to be fun. Zooming in is especially tiresome. There
were only 74 visitors to the program's home page from March 1999 to February
2000. Something doesn't seem right. Won't you please visit this lonely site
and cheer it up? |
 |
Fractal Lab Kit. Ronald T. Kneusel. 1994
fractal-lab-kit.sit [ 146k]
A command-line-driven IFS program. Why bother programming for the Mac if
you're not going to make use of the GUI interface? The full package also
includes one program for Julia set exploration and another for the Mandelbrot
set. I can only get them to draw one image each before they crash. |
 |
Fractal Studio (formerly Fractals). Keiron Liddle, Aftex Software.
1999.
Aftex Software [external link]
Draws 30 different fractals. Has a ton of different options to play with.
I haven't had the energy to fully explore this monster. |
 |
FractalDesigner. Martin Hairer. 2000.
HairerSoft [external link]
Renders preset as well as user-defined functions. CodeWarrior users can
even program it to draw Markus-Lyapunov fractals, but others have to live
with the presets. I appreciated the flexibility, but was disappointed by
the lack of speed and mediocre user interface. |
 |
Fractal Generation. Laurent Thil. 2001.
Laurent Thil [external link]
Draws Mandelbrot, Julia, and "Magnetisme" fractals in your choice
of colors and rendering schemes in a teeny tiny little window. Also renders
disorienting QuickTime movies that make you feel like an ant crawling over
a fractal textbook. Comes with preset parameter files to get you started
-- an absolute necessity given that the program is basically a "black
box". The author is probably the only person who really knows how to
use it. (Not to be confused with Fractal Generation Program by Cathy and
Tom Saxton filed above under Mandelbrot & Julia
Sets.) |
|
Fraxious. Alan Smith. 1995.
fraxious.sit [ 434k]
Mandelbrot and Julia sets, Newton's method, Hénon and other strange
attractors, Brownian motion, and Lyapunov fractals. Crashes whenever I try
to draw a strange attractor. The Read Me admits it's a buggy program. Not
PPC optimized, so it's slow. |
 |
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 (Hopalong). Gives you the ability to check out a lot
of different fractals using just one application. Also available in a version
for OS X. |
|
IconMaker. Jim Burgess. 2001.
Jim Burgess [external link]
Plots points in the orbit of four unique iterative mappings up to the twelfth
power. Color indicates the density of points at a particular location. Sliders
permit you to change all five of the parameters that control the mapping.
You can also bookmark interesting combinations and return to them later.
This is a necessary feature given that it is quite easy to get lost among
all the numbers. |
|
Iterative Functions. Harold Brochmann. 1992.
iterative-functions.sit [ 134k]
An odd suite of six programs: diffusion limited aggregation, real orbits,
complex orbits, the Mandelbrot set, logistic equation, and population dynamics.
Lousy interface that makes no use of Mac features. A time capsule from the
bad old days. Great in terms of content, however. Someone should rewrite
this suite and wrap it in an up-to-date interface. |
 |
Lyapunov. Andrea Pellizzon. 1994
lyapunov.sit [ 263k]
Lyapunov diagrams in this book were drawn using this program. This is the
only program I know dedicated to drawing this kind of fractal. The author
has a home page, but it never mentions this program. |
|
MacFractint. Tim Gilman. 1999.
Fractint for the Macintosh [external link]
Room for one more. Won't you join us? A well loved Windows-Intel classic,
Fractint may finally make it to the Mac OS. The current beta version
has a lot of preset fractals to play with, but the program as a whole is
obviously still under construction. |
 |
Persian Rug. Paul Cantrell. 1996.
persian-rug.sit [ 45k]
Persian Rug is a control panel that generates random fractal patterns for
your desktop. Don't like your current desktop? Open the control panel and
click the "change" button. A really great idea, but unfortunately
I was never able to run it for very long without having my machine freeze. |
|
Stone's Free Mac Programs. Ishihama Yoshiaki. 1996-2001.
Stone's Free Mac Programs [external link]
A prolific programmer, Stone has written around a hundred freeware applications
for the Mac OS including about a dozen chaos and fractal programs. All are
quite primitive and unpolished.
- ChaosGame: an implementation of the classic IFS routine.
- DLA: a rather slow diffusion limited aggregation simulation.
- Magnet: a chaotic assembly of free-floating magnets.
- MandelBrotMovie: self-explanatory.
- Mountain: a terrain generator.
- MRCM: "multiple reduction copy machine" -- some kind
of pattern generator.
- Terra: another terrain generator.
- Trajectory: draws strange attractors.
|
