[Bf-committers] Some Ideas for a Blender Plugin System

[Diego Gangl]

Hi all,

What would be the benefit of doing this, instead of expanding the python
api?

The only case I can think of is doing really complex computations or
working with large sets of data, and you already have three options for
that:

- Use numpy (for some things)
- Use Cython
- Start a process from python and communicate with pipes

A plugin/module system might sound great on paper, but I think it would be
a nightmare of corner cases.












2015-11-04 4:58 GMT-03:00 Sybren A. Stüvel <sybren at stuvel.eu>:

> On Tue, Nov 03, 2015 at 08:04:03PM +0100, matmenu wrote:
> > 2) Do you have a proof for this claim? I mean, modifier/operator
> > combinations already lead to bugs, I don't see why having them as
> > plugins/modules would make those problems arise more often?
>
> I don't understand your reasoning. To me it reads like "we get bugs
> now, so why would we get more when we complicate the software?" In the
> current situation there is a fixed set of functionality in C++
> (ignoring precompiler directives). In the case of a plugin structure,
> not only do we have the same set of functionality, but also situations
> where that functionality is only partially loaded. More different
> possible situations -> more complex -> more bugs.
>
> > 3) That's true, but then the user decide to install this module, so
> > he will report the bug to the original dev
>
> This is only true if the bug is trivial to to identify by end-users.
> Plenty of bugs won't be. Think about double-free bugs, where the first
> free is performed in the plugin. A crash may happen when Blender
> itself frees the pointer, and thus any traceback (if that's shown at
> all) will indicate a problem in Blender, not the plugin.
>
> > 4) Also true, but we now have a buildbot that can make builds on
> > demand for all supported OS. It could be used further by
> > module/plugin devs and avoid having to ship a compiler with Blender.
>
> AFAIK FreeBSD is not built by this system. Furthermore, allowing
> arbitrary third party code to be run on a BI/BF-hosted machine is an
> invitation for trouble. This already happens, but through the Git
> repository, so at least it's only done by people that have been vetted
> by receiving commit access.
>
> --
> Sybren A. Stüvel
>
> http://stuvelfoto.nl/
> http://stuvel.eu/
>
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>


-- 
--
Diego Gangl - sinestesia.co