I saw on a forum for a command-line MPG generation tool where some kid was 
giving the syntax he uses, and it must have been four lines of text!   No 
way that bloke is typing it out each time. I'm betting he has his most 
popularly-used syntax stored in some text editor.

I've tried some of the GUI editors for povray like Pyvon and QTPOV.  They 
have their strengths. I have however figured out a way to get most of the 
old Windows GUI look and feel to my povray experience on my own:

1) Edit scene files in Kedit, with a separate window open for each scene 
file you're currently thinking about.

2) Keep a "huh.ini" file open with an ini file that does things like declare 
your input file, your output file name, +W +H, etc.   The beauty here is you 
can comment out some not-infrequently used commands (like your animation 
setup) with a ";" so you don't have to retype them next time.

3) Open a shell. Your command-line command may simply then be:  "povray 
huh.ini" .   If you're doing multiple renders in a sitting, subsequent 
renders can be invoked via hitting the up arrow and enter.


There are actually strengths to *this* setup over perhaps even the windows 
GUI.   Perhaps I was too clueless to imagine this setup right off the bat. 
I'm actually guessing that not too many of you are actually going *pure* 
command line day in day out, perhaps even using "vi".  But I'm wondering if 
someone were to have suggested this setup to me when I started griping about 
the lack of GUI   that I would have been satisfied much earlier.

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Greg M. Johnson wrote:
> I saw on a forum for a command-line MPG generation tool where some kid was 
> giving the syntax he uses, and it must have been four lines of text!   No 
> way that bloke is typing it out each time. I'm betting he has his most 
> popularly-used syntax stored in some text editor.

He most likely has written a simple shell script for this.  Also don't 
forget you have a command history.

> I've tried some of the GUI editors for povray like Pyvon and QTPOV.  They 
> have their strengths. I have however figured out a way to get most of the 
> old Windows GUI look and feel to my povray experience on my own:
> 
> 1) Edit scene files in Kedit, with a separate window open for each scene 
> file you're currently thinking about.

Note using KWrite/Kate instead of KEdit will give you syntax 
highlighting.  In Kate you can avoid the separate windows and have tabs 
for each file like in WinPOV.

> There are actually strengths to *this* setup over perhaps even the windows 
> GUI.   

Quite a lot, for example:

- you can use different POV-Ray versions (official/MegaPOV) in parallel 
without having two separate editors open.
- you can run several renders at the same time without having multiple 
separate editors open.
- you can completely transparently work and render on different machines

> Perhaps I was too clueless to imagine this setup right off the bat. 
> I'm actually guessing that not too many of you are actually going *pure* 
> command line day in day out, perhaps even using "vi".

I think using ini files for the render settings like you describe is 
quite rare.  Storing the commonly used options in a scene file comment 
and putting them to the command line using cut&paste is what i do quite 
often.

> But I'm wondering if 
> someone were to have suggested this setup to me when I started griping about 
> the lack of GUI   that I would have been satisfied much earlier. 

Interesting point.  Note people quite regularly mention that they use a 
standard editor and the command line for operating POV-Ray.  But in fact 
this is something that is obvious to most regular Unix users so it is 
seldom pointed out explicitly. ;-)

But indeed for newcomers (not to POV-Ray but to the platform) the 
possibilities probably could be better described.

Christoph

-- 
POV-Ray tutorials, include files, Landscape of the week:
http://www.tu-bs.de/~y0013390/ (Last updated 24 Jul. 2005)
MegaPOV with mechanics simulation: http://megapov.inetart.net/

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There are some other aspects to consider as well.  Although a GUI is helpful

syntax the colorized editor just slows you down, and for more sophisticated
tasks the GUI can prove limiting and just get in the way.

For example, when creating animated sequences, it is helpful to endow
objects in the scene with knowledge of their dynamic abilities and an


case, I use Python to define the objects, their dynamic operations, and to
script their actions for the sequence I have in mind.  When the Python code
runs, the objects self-generate the necessary povray statements to render
the image for each frame in the sequence.  The command-line interface makes

scene files are generated and rendered automatically there is no need for a
GUI or other editor that understands the povray syntax.

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