Virtual Microscope for ME230 - Lab 2
This virtual microscope is written with the intention of emulating the experience of using an Olympus BHM metallurgical microscope that is available
in the undergraduate Materials laboratory within the Department of Mechanical and Mechatronics Engineering at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada.
The overall design philosophy of this microscope is to be as realistic as possible when compared to working with the real Olympus BHM in the lab.
Consequently,there are minor quirks that may seem inconvenient but they are implemented to replicate the same inconveniences when using the real Microscope, this includes but is not limited to:
- A minor loss of focus when the objective lens turret is moved
- enforcing the use of the x, y stage movement control rather than implementing a click and drag movement or other more convenient method
- the need to tell the software what objective lens is being used instead of reading it directly off the Objective lens menu
- the control for the focus is design to mimic the velocity of turning of the knob instead of absolute position
- and so on...
This has been tested on Mozilla Firefox 81, Google Chrome 85, and Microsoft Edge 85 on a PC. I do not own a Mac nor have access to a Mac, so I could not test this on Safari.
Disclaimer this applet was written with a fairly short development time (Less than 2 weeks) in response to the shift to online education as a result of the Covid 19 Pandemic.
The code can likely be better optimized and be more elegant, but as far as I know it should work without frying anyone's machine but I cannot offer any gurranttee on that.
Some well deserved praised: The samples and micrographs for this particular module was does with tremendous help from my TA past and current.
The samples were prepared with the help of a number of my past TAs, they are (in no particular order): Alireza Mohamadizadeh, Bruna Do Nascimento Figueredo, Jared Uramowski, and Mohammad Shojaee
The micrographs were taken by: Alireza Mohamadizadeh and Bruna Do Nascimento Figueredo
If I missed anyone, please let me know. So many TAs have helped with preparing these samples and micrographs that I am bound to have forgotten someone.
I am only a 'recreational' programmer not a professional. Moreover, this applet was written mostly outside of normal working hours (and in the late night usually) after a long day of work so I cannot guranttee there are no mistakes here and there. If you do spot it, you can try to contact me but I'm unsure when and if I can fix it.
