There is a good viewer created by Jason Ku. It’s an excellent implementation. But it’s written in CoffeeScript and I wanted a more accessible and extensible implementation that can be part of the bigger growing system for origami simulation so I made the following decisions:
The sophisticated type system of TypeScript makes it possible to express the FOLD file format specification in a very concise and elegant way (as in the fold_format.ts file). As the FOLD format specification evolves, maintaining the implementation reflecting the new changes in the specification would be a no-brainer.
Working on the interactive origami simulator at d-origami I find current origami diagrams and d-origami lack features that can make origami much more joyful and engaging. Here is my idea about hyper-diagram - a new kind of origami diagram.
TL;DR: Hyper-diagram is an interactive, dynamic origami diagram recreated for digital age.
Music Notes and Origami Diagrams
(or the importance of origami diagrams)
I often find a close analogy between the origami diagrams and music notes.
Music note is lingua franca for music. Essentially a common notation system that makes it a dominant medium for conveying music. It's getting even more valuable when you enjoy or learn by yourself without a teacher.
Diagrams are lingua franca for origami. Essentially a common notation system that makes it a dominant medium for conveying origami. It's getting even more valuable when you enjoy or learn by yourself without a teacher.
Human interaction is great and actually one of the best parts of origami-related activities. Nothing can be better than learning directly from and sharing the joy of creation with real people but still, the value of quality medium is huge.
Origami Diagrams: Good Parts
Crease patterns and videos are also used in modern origami community. And yet origami diagrams are by far the most used format for learning and sharing origami because they faithfully reflect the essential characteristics of origami.
Characteristics of Origami
It's 3D, a spatial representational form of art, just like sculpture or architecture.
It's the folding process that gives us the joy of creation, discovery and sharing. We usually enjoy beautiful sculptures but less likely the creation process, often lonely and painstaking process. But in origami, we appreciate the folding process as well as the finished art. Often even more than the finished origami itself.
It's easy. Very cheap and easy to start, even for kids.
Features of Origami Diagrams
Intuitive, easy to understand (for the most time)
Common, simple notation (thanks to Akira Yoshizawa, the grandmaster of origami)
Sequential yet in full timeline context
Origami Diagrams: Wanted Improvements
But I think the origami diagrams have the following problems to be fixed or can be improved:
It’s 2D since they’re drawn on paper no matter how they try to depict a 3D representation of origami sheets.
It’s static. The dynamic and magical transforming process of paper sheets along with the timeline is barely expressed.
It’s not always easy to understand. Sometimes very difficult to interpret the intention of instructions especially for tricky folds. I often get stuck while trying hard to properly understand those instructions. I’m sure others have similar experiences.
It’s difficult to create. Creating diagrams is not what many people do (usually artists and publishers do) but still are too difficult than it should be. Quite similar to architectural drawings and unlike fine arts, origami diagrams has both artistic and engineering aspect and engineering parts like geometric shapes correctness can be fully automated.
Traditional architecture drawings have been fully digitized nowadays being benefit from CAD systems and simulations. Origami diagrams can have a similar transition by taking a ride on the digital revolution and engineering correctness can be obtained with zero effort from the creator.
Hyper-Diagrams - New Kind of Origami Diagrams
I believe origami diagrams can be something much more dynamic, fun, easier to enjoy, and create than they are now if they have the following features:
Full 3D - ready for VR/AR/XR technology
d-origami already showed the possibility
Fully Interactive - something we can act on, even directly editable
sheet and instruction in each step is fully engaged with the user interactions such as zooming, rotation, etc.
Animated - something dynamic, alive, and living creature-like
Hyperlinked - something smart eg. references to used bases or similar works or other media such as books or videos. Not anything new but seen enough from the web pages and ebooks nowadays.
Self-generated - automatically created from the user’s recorded folding steps. As more features are added artistic touch can also improve.
Now What
I’m starting to build a prototype of hyper-diagrams for showing how they work and getting feedback from the users. Maybe I need another dedicated article for a detailed feature list of hyper-diagrams. Also working prototype itself accessible to d-origami users.
Your feedback is highly wanted and appreciated. Leave comments or send a message to me “innan.yun at gmail dot com”.
Reference Products
WikiHow Origami diagrams utilizing heavy use of videos - Already has several wanted features of hyper-diagram: animated, and hyperlinked. But not fully 3D, limited interactivity, fixed viewpoint (of a camera), and (seemingly) hard to create.
Hi @hm933, thank you for your feedback. Your comment and feature request are priceless to us.
I tried to rephrase my understanding of your feature request in a more tech-savvy way below hoping you can pinpoint specific ones for me:
“to flatten paper”:
“to straighten paper”: to align sheet direction with
The ticked ones in the above list are already implemented features (at least partially if not complete). My question: “you want a quick way to unfold the sheet completely flat (preserving crease lines)”
Let me answer with those existing features for quick solutions based on my current understanding hoping they can make your d-origami experience even a little easier.
Flattening
Click the “back” button () to UNDO the last fold and proceed one step backward. If you make a new fold here then the last fold is discarded and the new fold is recorded. Click the “next” button () to restore the last fold.
Click the “skip to the start” button () to start over. Once you start a new fold sequence, the fold sequence you’ve made so far is discarded.
“Snap” feature helps you aligning fold lines or face planes with other edges or planes while you’re making fold lines. Note that this feature is still far from complete. Your case is related to this.
Straightening
Double click the sheet to reset it’s position and direction (transformation) back to the initial value.
Right drag in the background to rotate the sheet around Z-axis while left drag is for free rotation around any (X, Y, and Z-)axis
Double click in the background for quick rotation for 45° in that direction
Gocha! You’ve actually found a bug in our system and I thank you for your spot!
This is quite embarrassing. It will be filed to our issue tracking system and we’ll start working on it. Not sure how long it’ll take to resolve this but will try at our best. Will update you as soon as possible.
The simulator is back. Sorry, it took longer (~12 hours) than expected. Definitely need much improvement in process and workflow. Hope we could devote a fuller effort to improve d-origami once we get funding.
Feedback and comments are more than welcome.
Happy folding!
Terribly sorry to announce that the d-origami simulator will not be available temporarily during the system maintenance (27 Oct 2020 16:00 UTC - ?) for restoring paper selection UX with additional paper size (US letter). Sorry for the inconvenience. We’ll try to bring back the simulator ASAP.
@hm933, you pointed correctly. Your sight on code is really sharp. Amazing.
Currently, two paper sizes (aspect ratio to be exact) are supported: the square (1:1), and A4 (11.69:8.27). But selection UX has been temporally disabled due to poor readiness for mobile screens. Definitely need more UX design work to make d-origami equally work for any devices.
Do you want to bring them back for trying on desktop screens?
The email registration has been restored thanks to @koreex’s effort. He contacted the VPS provider to ask unblocking for the email service ports which was set for obvious security reasons.
”
) to UNDO the last fold and proceed one step backward. If you make a new fold here then the last fold is discarded and the new fold is recorded. Click the “next” button (
) to restore the last fold.
) to start over. Once you start a new fold sequence, the fold sequence you’ve made so far is discarded.
) in 
Definitely need much improvement in process and workflow. Hope we could devote a fuller effort to improve d-origami once we get funding.