Re: [Closed REQ 5121]:

["Daeron Meyer" <daeron>]

> 
> From: nswarup at ai.mit.edu (Nitish Swarup)
> Date: Sun, 30 Oct 94 00:51:29 EDT
> Message-Id: <9410300451.AA13320 at cocoa-puffs>
> To: software@geom
> 
> 
> hi!
> 
> I am currently using version 1.4.3 for the SGI INDY and am wondering
> 
> a) if version 1.5 that you just released is available for the SGI
> b) what is different about 1.5 from 1.4?
> 
> Thanks much.   BTW, I am *very* impressed with your softwre development
> efforts; geoview is truly a remarkable tool that will significantly aid
> our research here at the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory.
> 
> Sincerely,
> Nitish Swarup
> nswarup at ai.mit.edu
> 
> 
> 

Hello Nitish,

  The answer to your first question is, no, version 1.5 of Geomview is
not available for the SGI yet. It should be available in the near future
though. In answer to your second question I am enclosing the list of
CHANGES from 1.4.3 to 1.5. The majority of improvements have been in
the X11 rendering code which now does z-buffering, gouraud shading
and dithering, making its display quality closer to the high quality of
3D graphics natively available on SGIs and NeXTs. However, there have
also been some significant bugs fixes and additions to the common code
which will influence the SGI version. Here are the CHANGES:

=====================================================================

   Substantial improvements to the 3D graphics in the X11 version of Geomview:
	- Uses X Shared Memory extension (when available) for
		quick rendering of polygons and lines to X11 framebuffer
	- Support for 1, 8, or 24 bit deep X displays added
	- Optional dithering for 8 bit displays
	- Dithers 1 bit displays
	- Optional zbuffering (for hidden line/surface removal) added
	- Smooth shading added
	- Support for line thickness > 1 added
	- Clipping planes added

   Numerous fixes/additions to the X11 Geomview Motif interface:
	- Window positioning commands work (under most window managers)
		except for the Load and Save panels
	- fixed edit menu
	- added ability to type in RGB values in color panel
	- added numeric displays for sliders on material panel
	- added option menu on camera panel for choosing
		hidden surface removal method
	- added toggle button on camera panel for activating/deactivating
		dithering of colors (only shows up in 8 bit mode)

   Unlike the beta-release X graphics, the new version transmits complete
	images, not polygons, to the X server.  It's faster for local
	displays; can be slow when the display-to-geomview connection
	traverses a slow network link.

   Geomview motions:

     INCOMPATIBLE bug fix in the GCL command language:
	Motions defined with respect to the object itself, e.g.
	 (transform world world world translate 0 0 1)
	had been interpreted with the wrong sign.  This is now fixed.
	Application programs which depended on this bug (including gvclock
	and stereo) need to change accordingly.

     Documentation fix: GCL rotations (transform/transform-incr/transform-set)
	are given in radians, not degrees.

     New motion-animation commands:
	The (transform ...) command now allows a simple form of animation.
	If given an amount of time, it arranges to move by exactly that amount
	during approximately that many seconds, either at constant speed
	or with smooth start and stop.

     Scaling now happens with respect to the selected "center" object,
	not the object's own origin.  There's a new (transform ... scale ...)
	subcommand.

   Keyboard input:
     New (event-keys) and (event-pick) commands can suppress geomview
	interpreting keyboard input as commands and rightmouse-clicks as
	picking, in graphics windows.  Useful for modules which want to impose
	their own interpretations on events.

   Non-Euclidean spaces:
     Newly created cameras now correctly live in the current (possibly
	non-Euclidean) space.   They had been always Euclidean,
	despite misleading window titles.
	
   N-D projection:
     New "nOFF" object is a collection of 0-, 1- or 2-dimensional polygons
	in N-dimensional space.
     N-D coloring projection axes can be with respect to any coordinate system.

   Two-sided surface coloring:
     The "backdiffuse" material field, if defined, is interpreted as the
	reverse-side's diffuse color.  Works whenever software shading
	is enabled (i.e. always on generic-X systems); also works on those
	SGI systems whose hardware supports two-sided GL lighting.  There's
	no control panel for this feature yet but GCL commands can, e.g.
	(merge-ap world { material { backdiffuse .7 .5 0 } })


   There were a number of portability improvements in the X version,
	fixing bugs for Sun/Solaris, HP-UX, Linux, DEC OSF, AIX.

   Code is now more careful to avoid floating-point exceptions, which
	cause trouble on some machines.

   Yacc and lex, which were needed for one library, are no longer essential.