Undergrad Light Clock Animation App: Find, Start & Feedback

[joekahr]

TL;DR

App that uses a Light Clock animation to learn about special (and general) relativity.

I have written a Javascript/HTML5 app that simulates a Light Clock as a way to understand the kinematics of relativity. It shows special and general relativistic effects, and how they are related. I would appreciate any feedback on the app, it's correctness, and it's usefulness as a learning tool.

Find the app here. Start the app in a web browser on a computer, smart phone, or iPad. After starting the animation double click to bring up the control panel, double click again to hide the controls.

Comments and questions are welcome:
Does the app work on your device?
Would a YouTube tutorial be necessary, or is the app enough by itself?
Do the FAQ answers make sense?
Is the physics right, wrong, or not even wrong?
Are there missing features? Too many features?

 

[robphy]

It looks like a nice app. (It seems to work on my phone and windows laptop.)
You should include a screenshot in your post. (Just copy the screenshot to your clipboard, then paste.)
It's good that you draw both the usual transverse light clock and the (often neglected) longitudinal light clock.
Having tunable parameters is nice for interactivity.
Having two separately tunable clocks might be useful for comparison.I did something similar which you may be interested in.
I created animated spacetime-diagrams of ticking "circular light-clocks" (not just the transverse and longitudinal clocks) from screen-captured VPython.
http://visualrelativity.com/LIGHTCONE/LightClock/
which is based on my paper "Visualizing proper-time in Special Relativity" https://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0505134
The spacetime diagram of the longitudinal light-clock encodes useful geometrical information that can be used for calculations (see my PF Insight https://www.physicsforums.com/insights/relativity-rotated-graph-paper/ )

Here's one that I posted on YouTube that visualizes the clock-effect/twin-paradox.
(It was written using an early version of VPython.
I have to rewrite it using the latest version of VPython/Glowscript... a backburner project.)
My visualization of the Michelson-Morley apparatus https://www.geogebra.org/m/XFXzXGTq might be useful for comparison.By the way, here is a clip from Mechanical Universe (episode 42, t=24m08)
which only draws the transverse light clock in a spacetime-diagram.

 

[joekahr]

Summary:: App that uses a Light Clock animation to learn about special (and general) relativity.

I have written a Javascript/HTML5 app that simulates a Light Clock as a way to understand the kinematics of relativity. It shows special and general relativistic effects, and how they are related. I would appreciate any feedback on the app, it's correctness, and it's usefulness as a learning tool.

Find the app here. Start the app in a web browser on a computer, smart phone, or iPad. After starting the animation double click to bring up the control panel, double click again to hide the controls.

Comments and questions are welcome:
Does the app work on your device?
Would a YouTube tutorial be necessary, or is the app enough by itself?
Do the FAQ answers make sense?
Is the physics right, wrong, or not even wrong?
Are there missing features? Too many features?

App location has changed to https://joekahr.github.io/lightclock/