[Bf-committers] ODE changes

[bf-committers@blender.org]

Maarten:
> Now I have three questions, please comment:
> 1. Why not move ODE out of the source tree?

Sure, no problem. I checked it in at the same directory level as the Sumo
physics library originally was. I'm not sure how Blender handled "external"
libraries in the past - the only reason I checked it in is so that the
user doesn't have to download ODE separately to compile.

Hans said:
> External code should be checked into CVS on the vendor branch only (for
> easy updates) anyway.

So I guess ODE should be moved into "the vendor branch", wherever that
is.

Maarten:
> 2. Why can't we make changes to the ODE tree to get it to run? I know 
> there should not be two source trees but if ODE does not work for us, 
> why not make it work and possibly post updates to the author once in a 
> while?

My only concern was keeping Blender-modifications in sync with the official
ODE source tree.

> 3. How active is development on ODE? The 0.03 version I used seems to 
> be the most recent and is dated 25 December 2001.

The CVS version is quite more recent and has some bugfixes for slider joints,
some LCP solver fixes, a new version of the triangle mesh collider should be
coming out soon, etc. Development isn't massively fast, but there are a few
people who do work on it regularly. Check out the mailing list at
http://q12.org/pipermail/ode to get a feeling for the community activity.

-Norman