[Bf-committers] About COLLADA im/export functionality situation

[Gaia Clary]

Hi, Arystanbek

Thank you very much for the detailed analysis of the reports.
I am currently maintaining the following Wiki page for
organizing the current efforts to improve Collada:

http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:2.5/Source/Development/Todo/Import_Export#OpenCollada

I think that is the best place to merge your analysis into that page.
I also believe that due to the current activities some of the reports
have been solved already.

It would be helpful if you could take a quick look at the
"green" reports and give your feedback if these are really
fixed by now.

Also do you have any advice on how we actually can verify
that a certain collada export contains what it should contain ?

Do you know about some sort of "test viewer" ?
For static meshes i currently use MeshLab to verify that
the data is readable and consistent. But the main issues are
with exporting animation data (armatures, weights, etc...)

At the moment i only can verify that the exported rig and
the mesh weights are now recognized from the
Second Life Importer. But it would be of a much higher value
if there where some "Collada standard viewer" where we can
check the exports.

If such an option exists maybe even from OpenCollada, then
it would be just great to get that to work :)

cheers,
Gaia

Am 06.02.2012 22:17, schrieb Arystanbek Dyussenov:
> I have looked through all COLLADA bugs in the bug tracker, both open and
> closed, and divided them into two categories: bugs in the existing
> functionality (I called them "core bugs", because I think they are the part
> of the main functionality, which has to constantly work well) and features
> not yet implemented.
>
> The result you can see
> https://docs.google.com/document/d/1BPNqt9j3lASpfqbi17JUQawNLeahpjAVrbor7eSV_N8/edit
> .
>
> On Tue, Feb 7, 2012 at 2:51 AM, Arystanbek Dyussenov<arystan.d at gmail.com>wrote:
>
>> On Mon, Feb 6, 2012 at 1:42 PM, Campbell Barton<ideasman42 at gmail.com>wrote:
>>
>>> These goals are too fuzzy for a GSOC project, the 3 main priorities
>>> you list are speculative - designing new shiny architecture without
>>> tangible results is a mistake.
>>>
>>> Further, I don't think finishing off Collada makes for a good GSOC
>>> project. The current problematic compatibility issues make for too
>>> much of an unpredictable project.
>>>
>> I purposely left out the details to make the whole picture clear to all.
>> The suggested goals are based on my experience working on the project and
>> on the real analysis that I conducted in order to understand the current
>> situation.
>>
>>
>>> - Maybe there are a few main bugs that only need fixing before its
>>> generally useful...
>>> - Maybe its far more work then we can expect from a GSOC project
>>> - Maybe we need to kick out opencollada (and use something else)...
>>>
>> The developers need good architecture to feel themselves comfortable with
>> the code. But rewriting the architecture as well as introduction of
>> automated testing requires considerable effort, so sponsoring is necessary.
>>
>>
>>> Since nobody seems to have a good handle on this, I think we're better
>>> off having this resolved outside of GSOC.
>>> Where motivated devs can focus on key issues without trying to fit
>>> this into a 10week project.
>>>
>>> If these devs want to re-factor the code or cleanup the architecture,
>>> they can go ahead since they will be having to work with the new code
>>> anyway.
>>>
>> I wrote this proposal because I think I can, using my knowledge, improve
>> the current situation and direct the project in the direction, where it
>> will begin to bring the desired results.
>>
>> --
>> Best regards,
>> Arystanbek Dyussenov
>>
>>
>