OpenSpace Explorer

OpenSpace Explorer is an interactive astronomy exhibit built on OpenSpace. It was created during the 2026 Summer Space Visualization Lab internship at the Adler Planetarium by Vanessa Garcia and Amir Sabljic as a replacement for the WorldWide Telescope exhibit.

The project combines OpenSpace assets and actions with a browser-based tablet interface. Guests can explore the Solar System, constellations, deep-sky images, asteroids, satellites, ground-based telescopes, space telescopes, and a lunar tardigrade easter egg.

Requirements

• Windows with OpenSpace installed. The project was tested with OpenSpace v0.22.0 at C:\OpenSpace-v.0.22.0.
• The OSBaseDefault assets installed in OpenSpace's user\data\assets directory.
• Git and Git LFS. The repository stores large 3D models and images with LFS.
• Node.js for the web server. A Windows installer is included in WWT\web.

Installation

Open Command Prompt and run the following commands:

winget install GitHub.GitLFS

git lfs install

git clone https://github.com/asabljic-adler/OpenSpace-Explorer.git

cd OpenSpace-Explorer

git lfs pull

The following commands create links from the OpenSpace installation to this repository. Replace C:\OpenSpace-v.0.22.0 if OpenSpace is installed elsewhere.

mklink /J "C:\OpenSpace-v.0.22.0\user\data\assets\WWT" "%cd%\WWT"

mklink /H "C:\OpenSpace-v.0.22.0\user\data\profiles\WWT_Replacement.profile" "%cd%\WWT_Replacement.profile"

mklink /H "C:\OpenSpace-v.0.22.0\user\config\WWT_Fullscreen.json" "%cd%\WWT_Fullscreen.json"

If these paths already exist, move or back them up before creating the links. The links let you update the repository without copying the asset, profile, and configuration files manually.

Running OpenSpace

1. Go to the user\data\assets\WWT\web directory within OpenSpace.
2. Install Node.js with the provided .msi installer if you want to use the tablet interface. Skip the optional additional tools during installation.
3. Run start-all.bat.

start-all.bat starts OpenSpace and the web server. The web page may reload while OpenSpace initializes. Once initialization is complete, the interface will connect to OpenSpace. The web server terminal prints the address to open, normally:

http://<computer-ip>:5000

For a tablet, connect the tablet and the OpenSpace computer to the same Wi-Fi network, then open the printed address in the browser.

Documentation

For additional help or information, please see the documentation.

Credits and License

Created by Vanessa Garcia and Amir Sabljic during the 2026 Summer Space Visualization Lab internship at the Adler Planetarium. Released under the MIT License.

Acknowledgments

The material contained in this document is based upon work supported by a National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) grant. Any opinions, findings, conclusions, or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of NASA. This work was supported through a NASA grant awarded to the NASA Illinois Space Grant Consortium under Grant No. 80NSSC25M7083.

Built on OpenSpace, an open-source interactive data visualization software supported by NASA.

Built for the Adler Planetarium's Space Visualization Lab.