Le_Forgeron <lef### [at] freefr> wrote:
[..]
> IMHO, main issue for 3.7 was licensing and parallel rendering on SMP. I
> heard there is plan for a rewrite as 4.0, once 3.7 is out.

Then maybe volunteering work for 4.0 is the wiser course of action rather than
spawn a separate project.

[..]
> A long time ago, I tried to push the SDL into a more conformant UML
> approach. If you like fancy uml diagrams in French, have a look at
> http://jgrimbert.free.fr/crayon.pdf

My French language abilities are close to non-existent, but I had a look at your
document anyway. To my surprise, reading French is so much easier than follow
spoken text that I can actually comprehend your writings. You give some English
translations in selected places, that also helps, plus UML is a language I can
"read". The pointers you added in you posting will also contribute to guiding
me.
Its still a slow process, I have to look up vocabulary in a dictionary but this
seems effort well spent - your text makes a good read, thank you for sharing.

[..]
> I'm a bit radical on that: no backward compatibility.
> (which is bad, as I enjoyed too being able to run old scene in modern
> process)

I tend to think of software design in layers, where a model in one layer is
rather loosely coupled to its neighbors. I understand, the CSG language used for
describing a scene in POV-Ray pretty directly maps to data structures and
functions in the render engine.
It should be possible though, to decouple the two layers language and renderer,
just like in the Model-View-Controller design pattern, where presentation of
data in a GUI, in the corresponding business logic and in backing storage is
expected to be independent and different.
Maybe its a good idea to give this some thought - backward compatibility is a
valuable asset (consider the huge library of existing scenery code!), I am
hesitant to sacrifice it on the altar of a new design.

[..]
> If you can fix the issue #217 (using +C to continue an animation-render
> with some existing frames already done), I would be delighted. I have no
> clue why it fails. (seems like a cache of something... I just get lost)

I'll try to set up a working development environment for POV-Ray and have a look
at it this weekend.

kind regards,

   MiB.

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