kicad-developers team mailing list archive

[Cirilo Bernardo <cirilo.bernardo@xxxxxxxxx>]

Hi folks,

 I'd like people's opinions on how to introduce the changes in the
management of
3D models. The existing refactored code introduces the following:

1. configurable model filename resolution: this allows the user to have
model files
in different root paths, for example the model directory installed by kicad
plus the
user's own model directory + system-wide non-kicad model directory etc. This
model resolution scheme also includes the current project directory in the
search
path for additional flexibility. The resolver paths can be configured via a
GUI which
is accessible from the File Browser.

2. 3D model parser plugin: the data for rendering a 3D view within kicad
can now
be managed by plugins. This allows the development/debugging of plugins
without
recompiling the bulk of kicad. In contrast the current system makes changes
to
the 3dviewer library which forces the re-linking of pcbnew and cvpcb while
touching
any related headers can force a broader recompile. It is possible to
develop the
plugins out-of-tree and versioning control can be used to ensure compatible
APIs.

3. 3D model caching: model data can now be cached in a binary file format;
this
can speed up loading of some model types, for example any MCAD model which
uses NURBS to describe surfaces. The cache can also write its data to a
VRML2
compliant file thus providing an automatic conversion from the plugin's
model type
to VRML.

4. Model preview: in the Footprint Properties dialogs you can see the 3D
model in
a window and interactively adjust the scale/offset/rotation parameters. The
original
concept was to provide a 3D preview within the File Selector dialog as well
but
that would require much more work (patching wxWindows + additional testing
on
Linux/MSWin/OSX) so I'll drop that idea.

Ultimately 3Dviewer will be replaced by a new rendering system which Mario
is
working on and there will be great improvements in the maintainability of
the code
as the entire 3D rendering code is cleaned up and its entrails removed from
other
code such as MODULE. However, that it a large task and may not be ready for
quite a few months. So I propose we take advantage of the current
improvements
by pulling in a subset of the new code. The code will provide everything
listed
above in 1-3 but will not yet provide the much desired removal of S3DMASTER
from MODULE - that step depends on the rewriting of the Renderer. Part 4
above
depends on the implementation of working 3D parser plugins; this is a work
in
progress and it will take a few months to reimplement the existing X3D/VRML
parsers as plugins.

I estimate 2 or 3 weeks to prepare a branch to merge a subset of the
existing
code which will provide improved 3D file browsing. Model parsers are
currently
in development but should be ready in the first quarter of 2016.

What do people think - should we introduce the current changes as soon as
possible, providing improved browsing, or wait a few months so that we can
include the preview window in the Footprint Properties dialogs?

- Cirilo