Christopher James Huff <chr### [at] maccom> wrote in
news:chr### [at] netplexaussieorg: 

>> > I think any new scene description language will have to be something
>> > like POV: partly a simple markup language or human-editable data
>> > format, with a scripting language and built-in support for vectors.
>> > Object oriented as well...POV is almost there, it could become a
>> > prototype-based OOL with just a few modifications.
>> Okay, that's fine. But please make sure we get good OO features.
> 
> Heh, I'm not on the design team...but the POV Team has hinted at a 
> "major reworking" of the language for 4.0.
> 
> Some other languages you might look at:
> Sapphire (on my web page)
> A prototype-based object-oriented language with a fairly Java or C-like 
> syntax. Very dynamic and flexible, built-in support for vectors, made to
> be embedded in other programs or run standalone.
> Wait a while though, I've made some big changes since the last release.
> 
> Io: http://www.dekorte.com/Software/C/Io/
> Very small, embeddable, pure prototype-based OO language.
> 
> Cel: http://freshmeat.net/projects/cel/?topic_id=49
> Another prototype-based language (can you tell I'm interested in 
> Prototype based OO? I think it applies well to this sort of problem.).
> 
> Also Lua, Self, Smalltalk, Objective C, etc...you mentioned Ruby, so 
> chances are you are already familiar with at least a few of these.

I agree with Lua choice :-)
It is small, fast, with a familiar and friendly syntax.
It is aimed as describing data, yet has powerful language features.
The last version allows to load a file with a custom loader: you can use it 
to load a description scene with Lua code embedded in it, a bit like PHP or 
ASP code can be embedded in HTML.
As per security, Lua allows to desactivate at runtime chosen functions from 
the provided library before executing a script. It is suited at user-defined 
level of security.

BTW, my idea of binary POV-Ray file format would allow this: to write a 
scene in one's favorite language, and to generate data directly 
understandable by the renderer, without additional parsing stage.

Biggest drawback: not all POV-Ray users would be able to understand/replay 
the scene. Imagine having Python, Perl, Ruby, Rebol, JavaScript, Lua, 
Scheme, Small, Java, Tcl, SDL, S-Lang, VBScript, etc. interpreters for POV-
Ray, all installed on your system. A nightmare for this newsgroup :-) Not to 
mention maintaining these interpreters for all platforms...

Bah, enough dreaming, neither Lua nor binary files will be used.
And, franckly, I can live without them in POV-Ray :-) But I could accept 
some SDL improvements, like a for loop, better functions, etc.

-- 
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Philippe Lhoste (Paris -- France)
Professional programmer and amateur artist
http://jove.prohosting.com/~philho/

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