OpenRocket: packaged installers for Windows and Mac to solve all your Java problems

[neil_w]

Excellent, glad to hear it. The nice thing with the packaged installers is that they are not "installing Java on your PC".

 

[David Schwantz]

neil, what is the packaged version ? Could it maybe work on vista? Thanks.

 

[neil_w]

neil, what is the packaged version ? Could it maybe work on vista? Thanks.

It's the installer linked in the first post of this thread. I think you already said it didn't work for you? (and BTW you should still upgrade at least to Windows 7 )

 

[David Schwantz]

Understand, but never needed to before this!!!

 

[David Schwantz]

Hi neil, tried it again but still will not open. Thanks, but "oh" well. Dave.

 

[GlueckAuf]

THANKS SO MUCH, neil_w, for migrating Open Rocket to a Windows installer. I'd never had a problem with the Java version until I upgraded my Home Theater PC's display to a new Samsung 4K QLED last weekend. Open Rocket's apparently non-adjustable font scaling in the component tree was really ugly at the TV's native UHD resolution (3840x2160), with each line of text overlapping the next. But reinstalling Open Rocket with YOUR more Windows-friendly distribution fixed the issue perfectly.

You're a hero!

Good skies,
GlueckAuf

 

[neil_w]

Glad it worked for you!

 

[Llyn]

Mods, pretty please make this a sticky.

Background
Skip over this section if you just want to get up and running as quickly as possible.

Normally when you download and run a Java program such as OpenRocket, it executes using the system JRE (Java Runtime Environment) installed on your machine. Unfortunately, different JRE versions (especially the newest ones starting with 1.9) do not always retain 100% compatibility. Or even if they're compatible in theory, various problems can crop up that cause your Java program to misbehave or crash. There are other annoyances as well, like you can't pin the OpenRocket JAR file to the dock on the Mac (at least, not in the app area where you'd want it), and on Windows OR doesn't behave well with high-DPI screens.

A solution to all these problems is to use packaged versions of the application. These install like regular applications, and include their own JRE built in. This bundled JRE will remain completely separate from your system JRE, and will only be used by OR. Therefore you do not need to have Java installed on your machine. Over the course of several months, these packaged installers have resolved every single instance of user having trouble running OR. At least that I've heard about.

The current version of OR is (still) 15.03; these packaged installers run the original OR code; nothing has been changed or modified here.

Windows
Click here for the installer. The file is hosted on Dropbox, but you don't have to register or anything. If you see this dialog:

just click on "No thanks, continue to view" at the bottom and then click the "Download" button on the next screen.

The application uses a standard installer, but it doesn't (at present) provide a shortcut on the desktop or the start menu. After installing, the actual executable file for the application is installed into your user/AppData/Local/OpenRocket folder. So you can go in there, right click the "OpenRocket.exe" file, and create a shortcut, pin it to the taskbar and/or pin it in the start menu, whatever.

Mac
Click here for the .dmg file. Again, this is on Dropbox; see above instructions to bypass the "register" dialog if you get it. This behaves like a typical application image: double click the downloaded file, and it will open up a window showing the OR icon and an alias to the "Applications" folder. Drag the OR icon onto the Applications folder icon and the app is installed there. Then run it from that folder, or use Launchpad, Spotlight, or whatever other application launcher you favor.


Enjoy!

My God I"ve been trying to get OR to work for months, ow I found this thread and you installer worked!! Many Thanks

 

[Wallace]

If this is not already,it should be a sticky. Fantastic job!!!!

 

[Arthur Brown]

I've downloaded OR then I found the .exe file here. I can do designs with nose cones, fins and rocket bodies but nothing else, no motors! Is it possible to use OR with W7?

 

[BEC]

You are designating whatever tube you want to put the motor into as a motor mount, right?

 

[Wallace]

I've downloaded OR then I found the .exe file here. I can do designs with nose cones, fins and rocket bodies but nothing else, no motors! Is it possible to use OR with W7?

I've had similar with some of my older (read crappier) computers. The only way I've found to solve it is to run O.R on a better machine..O.S. does not seem to matter. And just for kicks, Windows 7 is no longer going to be supported..

 

[EeebeeE]

I am still having problems viewing rockets in the 3D Rendering settings.

 

[neil_w]

There are occasionally graphics driver issues that the packaged installers don't really have any influence over. Can you describe your system (hardware and OS)?

 

[manixFan]

I am still having problems viewing rockets in the 3D Rendering settings.

I pretty sure there are known bugs in the 3D rendering screen. Not sure they are fixable.

Tony

 

[Wschmiedlin]

Mods, pretty please make this a sticky.


Windows
Click here for the installer. The file is hosted on Dropbox, but you don't have to register or anything. If you see this dialog:


View attachment 332959

OH YEA! That is awesome. This has plagued my system for a long, long, time. Thank you for posting this fix.

 

[Greg Furtman]

Thanks Neil Also, for all you Windows 7 people on this thread, it is still possible to download the most current Win 10 ISO, build a bootable USB drive with Rufus, and install Win 10 & activate it using your Win 7 key.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/software-download/windows10

https://rufus.ie/

 

[paulfecht]

Mods, pretty please make this a sticky.

Background
Skip over this section if you just want to get up and running as quickly as possible.

Normally when you download and run a Java program such as OpenRocket, it executes using the system JRE (Java Runtime Environment) installed on your machine. Unfortunately, different JRE versions (especially the newest ones starting with 1.9) do not always retain 100% compatibility. Or even if they're compatible in theory, various problems can crop up that cause your Java program to misbehave or crash. There are other annoyances as well, like you can't pin the OpenRocket JAR file to the dock on the Mac (at least, not in the app area where you'd want it), and on Windows OR doesn't behave well with high-DPI screens.

A solution to all these problems is to use packaged versions of the application. These install like regular applications, and include their own JRE built in. This bundled JRE will remain completely separate from your system JRE, and will only be used by OR. Therefore you do not need to have Java installed on your machine. Over the course of several months, these packaged installers have resolved every single instance of user having trouble running OR. At least that I've heard about.

The current version of OR is (still) 15.03; these packaged installers run the original OR code; nothing has been changed or modified here.

Windows
Click here for the installer. The file is hosted on Dropbox, but you don't have to register or anything. If you see this dialog:

just click on "No thanks, continue to view" at the bottom and then click the "Download" button on the next screen.

The application uses a standard installer, but it doesn't (at present) provide a shortcut on the desktop or the start menu. After installing, the actual executable file for the application is installed into your user/AppData/Local/OpenRocket folder. So you can go in there, right click the "OpenRocket.exe" file, and create a shortcut, pin it to the taskbar and/or pin it in the start menu, whatever.

Mac
Click here for the .dmg file. Again, this is on Dropbox; see above instructions to bypass the "register" dialog if you get it. This behaves like a typical application image: double click the downloaded file, and it will open up a window showing the OR icon and an alias to the "Applications" folder. Drag the OR icon onto the Applications folder icon and the app is installed there. Then run it from that folder, or use Launchpad, Spotlight, or whatever other application launcher you favor.


Enjoy!

View attachment 332959

Works perfectly ! Thank You

 

[bibbster]

Excellent! Thank you, sir!

 

[Greg Furtman]

I discovered on my Windows 10 laptop that OR was still having issues. But then I ran across a post on TRF where a fellow was having the same issues I was having. He found that if he ran it in Windows 8.1 compatability mode that everything worked properly. So I did the same thing & it fixed the problems.

 

[MGL]

I have struggled for two days trying to get OR to work, and then I found this sticky. Thank You so much, took 30 seconds and I'm up and running.

 

[Zae-in]

I use win10, the Java OpenRocket has stopped launching. te .exeversion of OpenRocket gives simulation readings very high compared to the java version.. installed it on a friends computer, simulated and there was more than a 3000m apogee difference between them

 

[neil_w]

They should be identical. Can you post the ORK file?

 

[Zae-in]

They should be identical. Can you post the ORK file?

/on the hava this gives 3036 m, but on the exe its 5701m

 

[neil_w]

On my Win10 machine, EXE on left, JAVA on right:

All numbers identical (I could only do the commercial motor sims of course).

Can you check that the simulation parameters are the same on both? Even then hard to imagine what could cause such large differences.

 

[Zae-in]

On my Win10 machine, EXE on left, JAVA on right:
View attachment 403214

All numbers identical (I could only do the commercial motor sims of course).

Can you check that the simulation parameters are the same on both? Even then hard to imagine what could cause such large differences.

.........the atmospheric pressure was set to 3mbar.....idkhtf man
Set to 1 bar it got 9963ft!
Anyways thanks a bunch

 

[manixFan]

.........the atmospheric pressure was set to 3mbar.....idkhtf man
Set to 1 bar it got 9963ft!
Anyways thanks a bunch

I think that has happened to me in the past. In the edit simulation dialog, if you un-tick the "Use International Standard Atmosphere" box, the pressure sometimes defaults to a really low value. Could be that was the issue. Glad you figured it out, stuff like that can be maddening.


Tony

 

[John Kemker]

For those using Linux, there are two solutions available:

$ /usr/lib/jvm/java-8-openjdk-amd64/bin/java -jar /usr/lib/openrocket/OpenRocket-15.03.jar

That command line runs the OpenRocket .jar file using the Java 8 JDK instead of the Java 11 JDK.

Alternately, go to https://www.rocketryforum.com/threads/openrocket-linux-appimage-beta-testers.155974/ and follow the instructions for downloading and running the Open Rocket AppImage. It's a single file that has everything you need to run Open Rocket without having to do anything else.

 

[ebruce1361]

Has anyone had an issue with the 3D images loading? I tried downloading Openrocket from the website as well as the link at the beginning of this post, but I can only get the basic side and end view. When I select the 3D view as well as the finished and unfinished view, the box is just blank.

 

[neil_w]

What does the Graphics tab inside Preferences look like?