NatureOnYourScreen
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Using the program
Here we present a tutorial for the downloadable version of the program. A video tutorial is to be added in the near future.
Tutorial
- Start the program.
- Choose the New > New ecosystem menu. You can setup the length of the ecosystem's grid. Let the settings remain at 300. Click the "OK" button to bring up the ecosystem window where you can see how many time units have passed and the sidelength of the ecosystem. You can control the simulation movements with the Control window.
- Click the "Apply" button to access the Map, in which the pixels represent all the individual organisms, and also the Zoom window for the yellow framework of the map. You can move the frame with the left mouse button. The females and males can be seen with the zoom by the conventional signs and the immature animals are marked with a simple ring.
- Click New > New plant menu to create a new plant: grass. On the appearing plant configuration window, set the Mass to 3, and the Growth to 1. Click the New > New animal menu and create a new animal-species: "rabbit". Because of the complexity we will setup this with a previously saved template: there is a folder icon with deer in the foreground on top of the window. With this button you can open the "rabbit.allat" (rabbit.animal) file. A drop-down list is located on the top of the configuration window where you can select which organism's parameters should be expressed. With the rainbow icon button you can change the colour of the species. In the Identification group you can find the name, the colour and an automatically generated ID number of the species. Click on the header of the groups to expand or collapse them. Let the rabbit eat the grass: write 0 in the Plant prays field (the ID of the grass is 0 from the plants), then move the cursor away. This step is important; otherwise the program will not perceive the changes. Then write 0 in the grass' Blocking animals parameter so that the grass cannot grow when a rabbit is standing on it.
- Now, let us prepare the fox with the "fox.allat" file following the above mentioned steps. Enable the fox to eat the rabbit. Set the Animal preys parameter to 0. The rabbit cannot step on a field where a fox is standing so you can write 1 in the rabbit's Blocking animals parameter. Now you can close the configuration windows. Later you can open it with the View menu.
- Let's start to plant vegetation. By clicking on the Map with the right mouse button the Install plexus window appears. Choose "grass" from the drop-down list and set the appropriate Individuals (amount) with the help of the ecosystem page length (in case of 300 it is 90000). After that, click the "OK" button. In order to let the grass grow, click the Next button on the Control window. You can treat the animals in the same way: on the Install plexus window pick the Animal tab. There you can select the rabbit, put in 2000 pieces with spacing every 7.
- You can start the simulation with the Start button in the Control window. The proliferating animals slowly reach the edge of the Map but do not interfere with a wall because the area continues on the opposite side. If the rabbits are sufficiently proliferated, put in 500 fox with Spacing every 20. During parameter changes it is useful to stop the running of the ecosystem in order to get ready sooner.
- You can observe the number of the individuals of a particular species with the help of the Windows > New diagram-window. Double-click the Searching button to access it. Try the effects of the Value-lines and Time-lines checkboxes. With the Divider tool you can set the scale of the vertical axis with a power: the basis can be changed with the arrows on the left; the exponent can be changed on the right. The recommended division for now is 2^7. If you continue dividing the scale, you can see the plants' curve as well.
- Let's introduce pesticides to the system. Stop running the ecosystem and view the animal configuration windows with the View > Animal-windows. You will handle the parameters of the rabbit, these can be chosen from one of the configuration windows drop-down list. Find the Degradable pesticide parameter group at the bottom of the window, click it, and scroll down until you can see all of the parameters. Tick the Deg. pest. effect. checkbox and set the deg. efficiency to 50. Resume the ecosystem then press the Degradable pesticide on the Control window. You can observe the results in the diagram.
- You can view the animals age pyramid using the Windows > New age pyramid-window menu. Stretch the appearing window wide. Select the rabbit from the list and set the Brandlength to 8 (how many animals does one pixel represent). Also try the Age organizing and the Brandwidth settings, too.
- You can resize the ecosystem with the Actions > Resize menu.