Hey Tom, There is a bit of research that has gone into the area of procedural geometry and parametric models, but there isn't really a complete high-level language (at least definitely not one that is cad-neutral) that serves the purpose you describe.
The closest that comes to mind is probably the GDML, which is a XML schema for geometry that CERN came up with a couple years ago. It surprisingly includes primitives and booleans, but it doesn't even begin to touch procedures or parametric support. Most of the procedural geometry research is very domain and application specific. One of the TODO items I've had in mind [1] for several years now is to implement support in BRL-CAD for a procedural geometry "meta-primitive" where there are user-defined shapes with parameters. [1]: http://brlcad.org/~sean/ideas.html That feature would allow users to define higher level objects and their parameters, similar to Cliff's tire tool, where a high level inputs are provided and those then cause more detailed geometry to be represented. If I wanted a "medicine pill" primitive, for example, tha was defined simply by a simple radius, I'd write a little procedure that would create two spheres, connect them with a cone that was maybe twice the diameter, hollow it out with subtractions, and then fill the pill in with little spheres. The idea is simply that the user specifies the parameters and writes the procedural logic. BRL-CAD just have to have support for an evaluation script engine to understand how to represent, manage, invalidate, and reconstruct the geometry represented by a procedural geometry definition. Cheers! Sean On Monday, January 25, 2010, at 09:28PM, "Tom Browder" <[email protected]> wrote: >Over the years I've scripted BRL-CAD models (one was very large and >detailed, others less so) with some fairly one-off Perl programs, some >with a kind of geometry input language that was used eventually to >produce another script that could be fed to mged. > >I find I am reinventing that wheel once again and don't want to waste >the effort if there is a better way. > >I know others have used the same kinds of kludges, but is anyone aware >of a serious effort toward some kind of high level, cad-neutral >geometry description language as an interface for a filter of some >kind that could output geometry in varying formats (kind of a geometry >compiler)? Would such a thing be of interest to other BRL-CAD users? > >Regards, > >-Tom > >Thomas M. Browder, Jr. >Niceville, Florida >USA > >------------------------------------------------------------------------------ >The Planet: dedicated and managed hosting, cloud storage, colocation >Stay online with enterprise data centers and the best network in the business >Choose flexible plans and management services without long-term contracts >Personal 24x7 support from experience hosting pros just a phone call away. >http://p.sf.net/sfu/theplanet-com >_______________________________________________ >BRL-CAD Developer mailing list >[email protected] >https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/brlcad-devel > > ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The Planet: dedicated and managed hosting, cloud storage, colocation Stay online with enterprise data centers and the best network in the business Choose flexible plans and management services without long-term contracts Personal 24x7 support from experience hosting pros just a phone call away. http://p.sf.net/sfu/theplanet-com _______________________________________________ BRL-CAD Developer mailing list [email protected] https://lists.sourceforge.net/lists/listinfo/brlcad-devel
