Ron Parker wrote in message <37651db3@news.povray.org>...
>
>I agree, in principle.  But you have to admit that someone who has
>added their own keywords certainly qualifies as hardcore.  So I
>guess it's sufficient but not necessary.

I cannot argue with this. However, in my mind the ability to overcome
certain limitations with nothing but innovative POV code has equal value.
Not only does that require inventiveness, but also great expertise with the
program at hand.

>By the same token, the original purity test has lots of questions
>about illegal drug use.  Those of who might normally score low
>on that test can't because they have at least a little respect for
>the law and/or their bodies.  Is that fair?  Probably not.  But it's
>their test, and they can put whatever they want on it.
>


I am by no means questioning the freedom of the test maker. But if you wish
to compile a test that gives objective results, that's damn difficult. I
know by personal experience.

Margus

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On Mon, 14 Jun 1999 21:03:59 +0300, Margus Ramst wrote:
>Ron Parker wrote in message <37651db3@news.povray.org>...
>>
>>I agree, in principle.  But you have to admit that someone who has
>>added their own keywords certainly qualifies as hardcore.  So I
>>guess it's sufficient but not necessary.
>
>I cannot argue with this. However, in my mind the ability to overcome
>certain limitations with nothing but innovative POV code has equal value.
>Not only does that require inventiveness, but also great expertise with the
>program at hand.

Indeed.  I tend to try to avoid patching the source as much as possible, 
too, believe it or not, if I think the current solution is adequate.  For
example, I saw no need for a keyword to auto-tile a texture by flipping
it on all axes when we already had a perfectly serviceable repeat warp.
Then there's that "hexagon-shaped tiles" thread from a while back, and
the perennial "object oriented POV script" thread.  And one I haven't 
weighed in on and will probably catch some flak over... I see no need 
for a replacement for #declare and #local -- If you don't like the extra 
verbiage, write a preprocessor.  I probably wouldn't even have added
the #spline code to the superpatch if I hadn't had the explicit goal of
adding ALL available patches (which I haven't achieved and probably
never will.)

But there are some things you just can't do with POV script, and being 
able to add them to the renderer, or at least understand why that can 
or can't be done (as, for example, you and Ken seem to) is a valuable 
skill for any truly hardcore POV user.

Post a reply to this message

Nieminen Mika wrote:
> 
>   The hardcore povrayer test.
> 
>   Read the allegations below. For each allegation that is true in your
> 
...
> --
> 

How about softcore one? E.g. one can count, to how many VFAQ questions
he/she can answer?
I don't dare to take this test, as I am afraid that I get negative
result, as I did with IQ test... 
Oh, smiley too ;-)

Post a reply to this message

I scored 0, or at least I expected to after question #20 or so.

I guess I must never show my face here again (so to speak).

Ciao!

Remco

Post a reply to this message

i got many of them but not the cammera in non hollow object hehehe :) but i
wouldn't say i'm hard core and adding a key word isn't that big of a deal really

Nieminen Mika wrote:

>   The hardcore povrayer test.
>
>   Read the allegations below. For each allegation that is true in your
> case, you receive the amount of points in parentheses at the end of the
> line. The maximum point amount is 78. Please be honest.
>   My personal score is 22.
>
> 1. You have participated in the IRTC and got to the top 20 best images. (2)
> 2. You have won a price in the IRTC. (3)
> 3. You have made bicubic patches by hand (and they worked as you expected). (2)
> 4. You have made a program which outputs bicubic patches. (1)
> 5. You have made big triangle meshes by hand. (1)
> 6. You have used a poly object bigger than 4th degree. (1)
> 7. You have calculated the polynomial for that poly object by yourself
>    (instead of just trying random values). (2)
> 8. You know the format of a PCM file. (1)
> 9. You have made one by hand. (1)
> 10. You have made a program which outputs a df3 file and used it in a
>     scene. (1)
> 11. You know what a df3 file is. (1)
> 12. You have made a patch for povray. (3)
> 13. Your patch is included in the superpatch or at least it's popular. (2)
> 14. Your patch will probably be included in povray 3.5. (2)
> 15. You have made a popular tool for povray. (2)
> 16. You have used every object type, every camera type, every light source
>     type, every media type, etc. and know how to use them. (2)
> 17. You remember the terms of the torus-shaped quartic so that you could
>     type the polynomial at any time. (2)
> 18. You understand perfectly the table at page 212 of the povray 3.1 manual
>     and use it to create your poly objects. (2)
> 19. You know what does 'sturm' mean and how it's calculated. (2)
> 20. The intensity multiplier curves and light fading functions in the light
>     source section in the povray manual are very clear and you understand
>     them perfectly and you actually use them to choose your light source
>     types. (2)
> 21. You understand how photon mapping works (at algorithm level). (1)
> 22. You have found the 'average normal bug' by yourself in a povray version
>     previous than 3.1e. (1)
> 23. You know exactly what was causing it. (2)
> 24. You never include the povray include libraries (like colors.inc) because
>     they slow parsing, but always define your colors, textures, etc by
>     yourself. (1)
> 25. You only use the png format when working with povray. (1)
> 26. You always use it with alpha channel. (1)
> 27. It's very easy to you to make slope maps and actually you often use
>     them to make your textures. (1)
> 28. You know what the 'use_index' keyword is used for without looking at
>     the manual. (1)
> 29. You understand the matrix transformation and you can write them by
>     hand. (2)
> 30. You know how to calculate the matrix from any number of consecutive
>     transformations (translate, scale, rotate). (1)
> 31. You have set up emacs with povray enhancements (like automatic indentation
>     and syntax highlighting) by yourself. (1)
> 32. You can list all the povray reserved keywords without looking at the
>     manual. (2)
> 33. You could make all the Chris Colefax's includes and macros by yourself
>     if you wanted. (3)
> 34. You use frequency, phase, octaves, omega and lambda without problems
>     when creating your own textures. (1)
> 35. You can tell what does each one of them do (without looking at the
>     documentation). (1)
> 36. You understand the scattering function pictures in the media section of
>     the documentation. (1)
> 37. You remember all the keywords that can be put in a global_settings
>     block. (1)
> 38. You know what does they mean and how to use them. (1)
> 39. Making good-looking radiosity images is not a problem to you. (1)
> 40. You remember all the built-in float and vector identifiers. (1)
> 41. You use all the vector and string functions without problem. (1)
> 42. Macros, arrays and file-IO directives are a piece of cake. (1)
> 43. You never get the "camera is inside non-hollow object" warning. If you
>     ever get it, it's absolutely intentional. (1)
> 44. You have made a modeller for povray. (3)
> 45. You often debug your povray code using the text message streams. (1)
> 46. You can easyly calculate the camera parameters when you want to put a
>     box right in front of the camera so that it completely and exactly fills
>     the viewing area. (1)
> 47. You scored in each one of the previous allegations. (10)
>
> --
> main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
> ):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

Post a reply to this message

Ron Parker wrote:
> 
> the perennial "object oriented POV script" thread.  And one I haven't
> weighed in on and will probably catch some flak over... I see no need
> for a replacement for #declare and #local -- If you don't like the extra
> verbiage, write a preprocessor.

But I'll change it if I want to!  :-)  hehehe.  Of course, I'll have to
release a second fix for it before I finally get it working correctly,
but that's only becuase I'm still learning how the tokenizer works and
I messed things up a bit with my original implementation.

-Nathan

Post a reply to this message

Margus Ramst <mar### [at] peakeduee> wrote:
: Entering vertex
: coordinates by hand wouldn't be difficult, just pointless, IMO

  Not pointless. I have done this by myself. Since I don't have any modeller
in which I could model triangle meshes, I often make my models on paper and
then enter the triangle coordinates by hand. I can't think of any other
way of doing it.

:>19. You know what does 'sturm' mean and how it's calculated. (2)
: I know what it means. Knowing the exact method is of little importance in
: POVing

  Yeah, but if you know it, it makes you a little bit 'hardcore povrayer' :)
  The user doesn't need to know, for example, how smooth triangles, bicubic
pathces or quartics work to just use povray, but if you know how they work,
you know what's happening when they don't work as you expected.
  For example, it's possible that you know why sometimes you get black dots
in a bicubic patch.

:>43. You never get the "camera is inside non-hollow object" warning. If you
:>    ever get it, it's absolutely intentional. (1)
: Or absolutely unimportant

  If don't care about that kind of warnings, then you can't consider yourself
a hardcore povrayer ;)

-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

Post a reply to this message

Nieminen Mika wrote:
> 
> Margus Ramst <mar### [at] peakeduee> wrote:
> : Entering vertex
> : coordinates by hand wouldn't be difficult, just pointless, IMO
> 
>   Not pointless. I have done this by myself. Since I don't have any modeller
> in which I could model triangle meshes, I often make my models on paper and
> then enter the triangle coordinates by hand. I can't think of any other
> way of doing it.
> 
> :>19. You know what does 'sturm' mean and how it's calculated. (2)
> : I know what it means. Knowing the exact method is of little importance in
> : POVing
> 
>   Yeah, but if you know it, it makes you a little bit 'hardcore povrayer' :)
>   The user doesn't need to know, for example, how smooth triangles, bicubic
> pathces or quartics work to just use povray, but if you know how they work,
> you know what's happening when they don't work as you expected.
>   For example, it's possible that you know why sometimes you get black dots
> in a bicubic patch.
> 
> :>43. You never get the "camera is inside non-hollow object" warning. If you
> :>    ever get it, it's absolutely intentional. (1)
> : Or absolutely unimportant
> 
>   If don't care about that kind of warnings, then you can't consider yourself
> a hardcore povrayer ;)
> 
> --
> main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
> ):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

  I have done so and would not undertake the task again unless the need were
very, very, great. Even though I have done so my largest hand coded mesh
object was minuscule in comparison to what most computer generated mesh
utilities output in quantity.



-- 
Ken Tyler

mailto://tylereng@pacbell.net

Post a reply to this message

I added Ron's suggestions. Thanks Ron.
  I also corrected the allegation 20. You got a point.
  I still think that the allegations should score 1 to 3 points. I think
it's much more notorious to be able to code all the Colefax's includes than
just know the format of a df3 file.
  The scores are my personal estimations. If you disagree on some of them
(too low or too high), I'll be glad to listen.
  With this new test my personal score is now 25. (The new questions start
from question 47, if you want to make the test again.)

1. You have participated in the IRTC and got to the top 20 best images. (2)
2. You have won a price in the IRTC. (3)
3. You have made bicubic patches by hand (and they worked as you expected). (2)
4. You have made a program which outputs bicubic patches. (1)
5. You have made big triangle meshes by hand. (1)
6. You have used a poly object bigger than 4th degree. (1)
7. You have calculated the polynomial for that poly object by yourself
   (instead of just trying random values). (2)
8. You know the format of a PCM file. (1)
9. You have made one by hand. (1)
10. You have made a program which outputs a df3 file and used it in a
    scene. (1)
11. You know what a df3 file is. (1)
12. You have made a patch for povray. (3)
13. Your patch is included in the superpatch or at least it's popular. (2)
14. Your patch will probably be included in povray 3.5. (2)
15. You have made a popular tool for povray. (2)
16. You have used every object type, every camera type, every light source
    type, every media type, etc. and know how to use them. (2)
17. You remember the terms of the torus-shaped quartic so that you could
    type the polynomial at any time. (2)
18. You understand perfectly the table at page 212 of the povray 3.1 manual
    and use it to create your poly objects. (2)
19. You know what does 'sturm' mean and how it's calculated. (2)
20. The intensity multiplier curves and light fading functions in the light
    source section of the povray manual are very clear and you understand
    them perfectly (and you might use them to choose your light source
    types). (1)
21. You understand how photon mapping works (at algorithm level). (1)
22. You have found the 'average normal bug' by yourself in a povray version
    previous than 3.1e. (1)
23. You know exactly what was causing it. (2)
24. You never include the povray include libraries (like colors.inc) because
    they slow parsing, but always define your colors, textures, etc by
    yourself. (1)
25. You only use the png format when working with povray. (1)
26. You always use it with alpha channel. (1)
27. It's very easy to you to make slope maps and actually you often use
    them to make your textures. (1)
28. You know what the 'use_index' keyword is used for without looking at
    the manual. (1)
29. You understand the matrix transformation and you can write them by
    hand. (2)
30. You know how to calculate the matrix from any number of consecutive
    transformations (translate, scale, rotate). (1)
31. You have set up emacs with povray enhancements (like automatic indentation
    and syntax highlighting) by yourself. (1)
32. You can list all the povray reserved keywords without looking at the
    manual. (2)
33. You could make all the Chris Colefax's includes and macros by yourself
    if you wanted. (3)
34. You use frequency, phase, octaves, omega and lambda without problems
    when creating your own textures. (1)
35. You can tell what does each one of them do (without looking at the
    documentation). (1)
36. You understand the scattering function pictures in the media section of
    the documentation. (1)
37. You remember all the keywords that can be put in a global_settings
    block. (1)
38. You know what does they mean and how to use them. (1)
39. Making good-looking radiosity images is not a problem to you. (1)
40. You remember all the built-in float and vector identifiers. (1)
41. You use all the vector and string functions without problem. (1)
42. Macros, arrays and file-IO directives are a piece of cake. (1)
43. You never get the "camera is inside non-hollow object" warning. If you
    ever get it, it's absolutely intentional. (1)
44. You have made a modeller for povray. (3)
45. You often debug your povray code using the text message streams. (1)
46. You can easyly calculate the camera parameters when you want to put a
    box right in front of the camera so that it completely and exactly fills
    the viewing area. (1)
47. You know which .c and .h files you must change to add a keyword to
    the parser. (1)
48. You can add a keyword and get it right the first time. (2)
49. You know which .c file contains the functionality for each aspect of
    the renderer. (1)
50. You can find a bug in the renderer source code given just a description
    of the symptoms and without using a debugger. (2)
51. You know BOTH reasons why a mesh can't be used in CSG. (1)
52. You know that 'merge' doesn't have to be a primitive CSG operation
    and can recite the equivalent sequence of intersections, unions, and
    inverses. (1)
53. You know that 'difference' isn't a primitive CSG operation and you
    know how POV represents one internally. (1)
54. You understand how 'bounded_by' _really_ works. (1)
55. You know that a height_field has an inside and how it is defined. (1)
56. You've written your own include file and distributed it on the net. (1)
57. Your include file used one or more of the following: macros, arrays,
    vector algebra (vnormalize, vdot, vcross) (1)
58. You understand all the options to 'media' without having to look in
    the manual. (1)
59. You scored in each one of the previous allegations. (10)
60. You didn't know the answer to one of the above questions so you tried
    to find it in the manual. (1)
61. You didn't know the answer to one of the above questions so you tried
    to find it in the source code. (1)
62. You didn't know that 'merge' wasn't a primitive but now that you do
    you have worked it out for yourself. (1)
63. You are one of the POV-Team. (3)



-- 
main(i,_){for(_?--i,main(i+2,"FhhQHFIJD|FQTITFN]zRFHhhTBFHhhTBFysdB"[i]
):5;i&&_>1;printf("%s",_-70?_&1?"[]":" ":(_=0,"\n")),_/=2);} /*- Warp -*/

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Nieminen Mika wrote in message <3765ed7e@news.povray.org>...
<snip test>

Got 5. Only 'cause I studied Computer graphics last year.
Guess I need to spend more time reading the docs.

Is there anyone else who thinks the 3.0 docs were better than
the 3.1 docs?

Gail
*******************************************************************
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* http://www.rucus.ru.ac.za/~gail/ * Insert cup and press any key *
*******************************************************************
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