[Bf-committers] irc meeting sunday march 30

[Ton Roosendaal]

Hi all,

Sunday march 30
irc.freenode.net, #blendercoders
16-18h CEST (day saving time)

Participants: SirDude, Hos, Aphex, LarstiQ, Sgefant, Green, UnNamed,  
IanWill, AerobicsBoy

This meeting was devoted to all current coding projects. Today I will  
also post an article at blender.org with an overview of it. The notes  
below are meant to accompany that overview.

1. Renderman support
Green is working at (C coded integration) of support for Renderman  
compliant renderers. He thinks it still needs another month of work for  
a first release. After summer it might be finished, with docs and  
tutorials as well.

2. Python
A new developer, IanWill, has worked with Michel at the API. As first  
result a Camera control module has been committed (to add a camera, and  
to control lens, type, clipping).
LarstiQ mentions remaining issues with reference counters. No  
development or restructuring is ongoing in Python that would block a  
2.27 release.
Interesting contacts have been established with MIT professor Neil  
Gershenfield, who is working on support for CAD and Rapid Prototyping.  
He seriously considers to assign a student to our python project. I  
hope to have a field report on this at the site soon.
http://www.media.mit.edu/physics/pedagogy/fab/index.html

3. Internal rendering
Cessen has been working on new shading algorithms in Blender, including  
cartoon and 'hatch' shading.
http://www.brunslo.com/cessen/blender_stuff/hatching.jpg
This can make it in the next release.

4. Character anim
Hos presented the (pretty ambitous :-) goals for work at the character  
animation system in Blender.
Releaseable is the first phase of auto-skinning.
Replacing the current 'parenting' and 'tracking' function with generic  
Constraints was discussed. Although this is a wanted feature, nobody  
has planned to work at this. Volunteers can contact me, to help  
understanding how the current system works, and point to the numerous  
pitfalls in touching that code!

5. Ghost
SirDude mentions a couple of Makefile and Automake issues still  
involved with the move of Ghost out of the Blender tree. He will work  
on this.

6. Interface translation, new fonts
Phase and Shizu have been working on this.
http://www.blender.org/ 
modules.php?op=modload&name=phpBB2&file=viewtopic&t=1205
A discussion arised whether 'fonts drawing' (with FTF) should become  
part of Ghost or not. Or offered as a library next to Ghost... Decided  
was to wait for a real proposal for this first, and move the discussion  
to the bf-committers maillist before deciding. SirDude and LarstiQ both  
have a clear opinion on this topic, and will also assist Phase and  
Shizu on this.

7. OSX
Decided was that ProjectBuilder support won't be officially supported;  
meaning we don't have to keep track of it or keep it compatible.  
However, volunteers who like to maintain it are free to keep it  
updated. (hehe, sounds like a real Dutch political compromise! :-)

8. Autoconf
Still some confusement around this issue. Conclusion was to still stick  
with the (NaN) makefiles as we use now, and wait for the autoconf  
project to come with a definite proposal and a 'go'.

New time proposal:
Next meeting sunday april 6, 21-23h CEST, 15-17 ESST, 12-14 PSST
(The extra 'S' in the timezone code means it is all day saving time)
Phase usually cannot attend sunday afternoons, so we'll do a later  
meeting again.

Cya!

-Ton-

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Ton Roosendaal  Blender Foundation ton@blender.org