In article <fq5gev4mgtjfim61hht3j2aqmc7drejnj7@4ax.com>, abx### [at] abxartpl 
says...
> On Wed, 11 Jun 2003 13:29:42 -0700, "Ray Gardener" <ray### [at] daylongraphicscom>
> wrote:
> > Yeah, that'll work, but what if a person
> > receives a scene from someone else that
> > hasn't been set up that way and he doesn't
> > know how to edit scenes?
> 
> Sorry, but imo editing text files is a basic skill nowadays.
> 
> > I'd say it's a bug: the quality INI setting
> > is intended to render scenes faster when
> > the quality is lower, but it doesn't
> > actually do that, because it lets some
> > high-quality features remain enabled.
> 
> And what if I want raw colors (quality=1) with focal blur to test focal blur ?
> And what if I want media without focal blur to test media ?
> How could I combine highier Quality setting with lower one ?
> 
> > Being able to work around the problem
> > isn't a solution, because expending the
> > effort for the workaround
> 
> It is not workaround. That's the purpose of conditional preprocesor directives:
> make parts of scene optionally parsed. Are you writing C++ programs. Can't you
> give compiler preprocesor definition? Is this workaround to defining constants
> in some kind of config.h or widely used alternative? Every programmer writer
> would choose the same preprocesor name for their preprocessor switch? SDL is a
> langugage, not GUI interface.
> 
> > defeats the
> > very purpose of the Quality setting: to
> > provide an easy way to globally render
> > scenes faster without having to care
> > about the scene's content or code.
> 
> And it works that way. Blur is not global property of scene but it is feature of
> camera. I consider it consistent.
> 

Heres an idea.. How about a simple way to have the SDL find out what the 
quality setting you are using is? Then you can use 'that' to 
automatically turn on/off things that you don't want used. I can see 
cases like the focal blur one you mention where it makes sense to leave 
things as they are, but at the same time it makes no sense to me to have 
to edit both the INI and the scene files to get it to turn everything off 
you want turned off for a particular test. However, as far as I can tell 
from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the 
SDL. It makes sense to not allow changing them, but not even finding out 
their current values?!

-- 
void main () {

    call functional_code()
  else
    call crash_windows();
}

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> Heres an idea.. How about a simple way to have the SDL find out what the
> quality setting you are using is? ... However, as far as I can tell
> from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the
> SDL. It makes sense to not allow changing them, but not even finding out
> their current values?!

That's a good point. Other systems let programs
query their environmental settings (e.g., getenv())

That could also be used to thwart global settings,
however, e.g., "if(setting is on) { do the opposite }"
Sometimes you want a master override switch
that there's nothing the scene can do about.
I would categorize overrides as being different from
environmental variables. You could do a quality
setting at either level for those times:

- When you want to "tell" the scene what you'd like, and

- When you want to force it to do what you like,
  no questions asked.


Here's a (possibly contrived) example: you're setting
up a web gallery and asked to render a hundred third-party
POV scenes into thumbnails. So you configure the quality
settings to omit intensive effects like radiosity/blur/etc.
because you must get all the thumbnails done in 24 hours,
and set up your system to batch render overnight.
You come back the next morning to discover that it's
still halfway through the third picture, becase it
has something that thwarthed the overrides.

Ray

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In article <MPG.1952784c48072a12989820@news.povray.org>,
 Patrick Elliott <sha### [at] hotmailcom> wrote:

> Heres an idea.. How about a simple way to have the SDL find out what the 
> quality setting you are using is? Then you can use 'that' to 
> automatically turn on/off things that you don't want used. I can see 
> cases like the focal blur one you mention where it makes sense to leave 
> things as they are, but at the same time it makes no sense to me to have 
> to edit both the INI and the scene files to get it to turn everything off 
> you want turned off for a particular test. However, as far as I can tell 
> from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the 
> SDL. It makes sense to not allow changing them, but not even finding out 
> their current values?!

This sounds like a great idea, and is extremely easy to implement...I 
sometimes use a "quality level" indicator, allowing this to adapt to the 
level specified with the quality option makes perfect sense.

-- 
Christopher James Huff <cja### [at] earthlinknet>
http://home.earthlink.net/~cjameshuff/
POV-Ray TAG: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
http://tag.povray.org/

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On Thu, 12 Jun 2003 20:59:51 -0500, Christopher James Huff
<cja### [at] earthlinknet> wrote:
> However, as far as I can tell 
> from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the 
> SDL.

Wrong searching. You can get values for all clock and frame related ini settings
as well as image dimensions. Additionally next MegaPOV will have reading of
output filename so you can pair it with own text outputs for each frame. Quality
reading could be also interesting.

ABX

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On Thu, 12 Jun 2003 14:10:16 -0700, "Ray Gardener" <ray### [at] daylongraphicscom>
wrote:
> you're setting
> up a web gallery and asked to render a hundred third-party
> POV scenes into thumbnails.

I hardly see somebody use rendering to make thumbnails. This is wasting of
computation power when rendered full image is available. AA should be high to
get valuable representation of the same content. Almost every 2D image
manipulation app has batch mode to create thumbnails in customized way.

ABX

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In article <lfoievs4aokpmd1lgbaji06ejkh6vh39v2@4ax.com>,
 ABX <abx### [at] abxartpl> wrote:

> On Thu, 12 Jun 2003 20:59:51 -0500, Christopher James Huff
> <cja### [at] earthlinknet> wrote:
> > However, as far as I can tell 
> > from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the 
> > SDL.

Uh, no I didn't...Patrick Elliott wrote that.

-- 
Christopher James Huff <cja### [at] earthlinknet>
http://home.earthlink.net/~cjameshuff/
POV-Ray TAG: chr### [at] tagpovrayorg
http://tag.povray.org/

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On Fri, 13 Jun 2003 01:47:45 -0500, Christopher James Huff <cja### [at] earthlinknet>
wrote:
> Uh, no I didn't...Patrick Elliott wrote that.

Sorry, answered in a hurry before daily company tasks :-(

ABX

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In article <lfoievs4aokpmd1lgbaji06ejkh6vh39v2@4ax.com>, abx### [at] abxartpl 
says...
> On Thu, 12 Jun 2003 20:59:51 -0500, Christopher James Huff
> <cja### [at] earthlinknet> wrote:
> > However, as far as I can tell 
> > from a brief search, none of the INI settings can be checked inside the 
> > SDL.
> 
> Wrong searching. You can get values for all clock and frame related ini settings
> as well as image dimensions. Additionally next MegaPOV will have reading of
> output filename so you can pair it with own text outputs for each frame. Quality
> reading could be also interesting.
> 

Yes the clock, frame and image dimensions are available to the SDL, but I 
was referring to stuff that would not have been considered strictly 
useful to know, like the current quality settings or other options that 
you "can't" retrieve in any direct fashion. So maybe 'none' was 
inaccurate, but I am still right about the rest.

-- 
void main () {

    call functional_code()
  else
    call crash_windows();
}

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