> Ack!!  Backwards compatibility should NEVER be a factor in determining
> features of new versions of *any* software.  The POV syntax is plain text,
> it's easy to edit a scene to fix/replace old code with new.  It might be
> time consuming (I'm currently converting an old 3.1 scene that used Halos
> extensively) but it isn't hard.  It's not even an issue of some people not
> wanting to upgrade to the latest version of POVRay because they can't
> afford the upgrade price.  <smile>  Backwards compatibility is the bane of
> all programmers!

Regardless, it would be beneficial (mainly since the language is being
overhauled anyway), to re-implement these features in a backwards compatible
manner, so that people didn't *have* to convert old scenes. Because it's
plain that every now and then, we're going to want to add new no_something
keywords. It will also get tedious to have to say no_image no_reflection
no_radiosity (and then whatever other modifiers are added to the language
later on) when you want an object to only cast a shadow.

(Here's a question: should the shadow of an object with no_radiosity (but
without no_shadow) affect radiosity? Perhaps there should be a
no_radiosity_shadow keyword to clear this up? It gets messy.)

 - Slime
[ http://www.slimeland.com/ ]

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