[Bf-committers] bmesh merge timeline

[joe]

I think we should merge bmesh into 2.5 in the next couple of weeks.
At first I wanted a completely stable and finished system before
release, but I don't think that will work.  For one thing, we'd have
to get editmesh into shape instead, which would mean parallel
development (and would be very bad).  For another, the october release
clearly isn't going to be 100% functional or stable anyway.  It seems
all around better for development to merge it in now.

So, the proposed plan is:

1. Merge lukas's project into 2.5 this week.
2. Merge bmesh into 2.5 a week or two later.

Lukas's code seems fine to me; I've looked over it.  Editmode handling
could be improved, but that's not lukas's fault; designing a really
robust system for sending incremental updates to the GPU for editmode
was outside the scope of his project, really, especially given the
architectural changes within DerivedMesh, the drawing infrastructure,
etc it likely would have required.  Besides, what he managed to get
working gives a significant (70% I think?) speedup in editmode,
anyway.

Bmesh integration is fairly close to feature complete.  Here are some
lists of missing features:

Things needed before 2.5 is released:
* Edge Slide.
* Loopcut.
* Make sure theeth's etch-a-ton thing works.
* Edgesplit modifier.
* Remove doubles tool (the code is there, I just need to hook it up to
a wm operator).
* Probably a bunch of minor things I'm not yet aware of.

I can do all of the above.

Editmesh tools that sortof work via the editmesh<->bmesh bridge, but
should be properly bmeshafied:
* Various selection tools; e.g. shortest path.
* Beauty fill.
* Edge fill.
* Triangles to Quads.
* Add Primitives.

I'd like these to be done before the release, but it's not really
terribly important to do so, functionality-wise.

There's also the issue of an RNA api; mesh RNA needs to be updated,
and an RNA wrapper around bmesh itself needs to be written (people
really shouldn't be writing python scripts that write to mesh DNA
directly).  I'm not sure if that last one is feasible before 2.5; if
not, people will simply have to live with limited mesh scripting
capabilities.

Joe