I made this browser sailing simulator over the last few days with the aid of various llm tools. Cursor and replit.
I am not an expert sailor but I have taken a license and went out some dozen times.
It is surprising how few vectors can create a reasonably realistic simulator of sailing. The wind push the sail based on the angle of the sail. The sail creates a vector that is decomposed on 2 vectors (forward and perpendicular to forward). These are the acceleration vector and the side leaning angle.
Then you add a drag that in this case is some function to the cube of the speed.
I think playing this make the physics behind sailing more understandable.
P.S.
I have almost zero following on Twitter but got retweeted by Replit's very own Amjad Masad https://x.com/amasad/status/1895055366817489131
