Surfer is a program to visualize real algebraic geometry in real-time. The surfaces visualized are given by the zero set of a polynomial equation in 3 variables. Surfer is based on the program Surf and has been developed for the exhibition IMAGINARY, organized by the Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach and created for the Year of Mathematics 2008 in Germany.

Windows Download (latest version)

Windows 2000/XP/Vista or Ubuntu/Linux.
256MB RAM, CPU 1.4 GHz or higher.

Windows: launch the file surfer-setup.exe and follow the instructions. Surfer requires the following runtime components, that will be automatically installed: Microsoft Visual Studio 2005 SP1, GTK+ and gtkmm.
Linux: For Ubuntu use the Debian-package (version 10.04). For other distributions, a manual for installation is provided in the Linux package.
Mac: see below. A new Surfer-version in Java is just in development.

Current Revisions (Last Update 11.01.2011):
Info: the latest version includes German, English and Spanish gallery texts.
Latest revision (Windows): Surfer Setup / Short Manual
Latest revision (Ubuntu/Linux): / Surfer Debian Package / Short Manual


Revision 223 (Windows): Surfer Setup / Short Manual
Revision 158 (Windows): Surfer Setup / Manual (German only)
Revision 120 (Windows): Surfer Setup / Source Code
Revision 55: (Windows): Surfer Setup / Source Code

Latest Revision (Linux): Source Code / Linux
Revision 197 (Linux): Source Code / Linux
Revision 193 (Linux): Source Code / Linux
Revision 174 (Linux): Source Code / Linux

Mac Surfer and Java version:
There is a version of Surfer for MAC provided by the Fink project. Details for installation are given here. A cross-platform Java Version is under development. A first version for Mac with simple functionality (raytracer, formula parser, colour picker and save picture function) is available either as Java (.jar) or as Mac Application (to be run directly in Mac OS X 10.6).

Surfer is based on Surf developed by Stephan Endrass and others (http://surf.sourceforge.net).
Direction: Gert-Martin Greuel
Programming: Henning Meyer (Surfer development) and Christian Stussak (Windows conversion, Java version, adaption of Surf)
Concept/Galleries: Oliver Labs, University of the Saarland
Support: Felix Riemann
Concept/Coordination: Andreas Matt
Contact: surfer(at)imaginary2008.de

The others of this software are not responsible for any damages created by using this software, whatsoever. Using this software is on your own risk and without any warranties.

A project of the Mathematisches Forschungsinstitut Oberwolfach and the Technical University Kaiserslautern, 2008.