[Bf-committers] Proposal for clarified VFX Reference Platform Support

[Scott Wilson]

I'm sort of out of the loop, but has there been communications with the VFX
Reference Platform recently? I think that some of the issues brought up
such as build flags for OpenVDB could be resolved. I know that as a
pipeline TD in a studio, having all of the vendors on the same page about
all attributes of the build environment makes my life much easier. So, I
throw what little say I have into getting Blender and the platform aligned.

On Thu, Jan 20, 2022, 11:22 AM Ray Molenkamp via Bf-committers <
bf-committers at blender.org> wrote:

> While I do not mind the practical nuts and bolts of this
> proposal at all, I do mind the language, referring to the
> VFX Platform as something worth looking at regarding file
> or platform compatibility is unfortunate.
>
> The Platform as is makes no attempt to manage file compatibility
> throughout the pipeline, the big-ticket items in this space such
> as USD and/or MaterialX aren't even in the platform, the things
> that are in the platform, such as OpenVDB that have _severe_
> file compat issues if build incorrectly do not even have a footnote
> about it. The only logical conclusion here is, the VFX Platform
> is a not authority to appeal to regarding file compatibility, so
> best not to.
>
> As for platform compatibility, the messaging in the VFX Platform
> is confusing, for linux it declares a glibc version, for macOS it
> declares a deployment target, so far so good, but then for windows
> it does none of these things, and just recommends a compiler and SDK of
> which neither determine the OS versions the resulting code can
> run on, the inclusion of python 3.9 indirectly implies windows 8.1
> is their minimum windows deployment target, but honestly I'm unsure
> if even they are aware of this implication.
>
> I'd like to see the proposal move more into concrete direction:
>
> > Blender does NOT follow the VFX platform.
> >
> > - Blender aims be compatible with operating systems VFX Platform
> compatible software will be able run on.
> > - blender aims not to break file compatibility for 3rd party formats
> such as EXR, VDB, Alembic: files exported from Blender should be usable in
> other software used in the pipeline, and vice-versa.
>
> The last item
>
> > - Not to break external render engines
>
> Is just not something I think we can we can practically commit to,
> these are generally linked directly to the python shared libs,
> and bumping python versions will definitely break most if not all
> of them.
>
> To put an end to having to have this conversation every year, I'd
> like to break the loop with the following text:
>
> > Major blender releases will ship with the latest major python version
> available during BCON1 in its development.
>
> My proposal
>
> - Clarifies our stance on the VFX Platform
> - Doesn't appeal to an authority the VFX Platform clearly lacks regarding
> file compat.
> - Somewhat commits to running on the same platforms as the VFX platform
> (as much as it can be deduced from the platform, they are vague about it,
> hard to make any solid commitments here).
> - Makes the python version blender will ship with predictable.
>
> Note that personally, I may or may not approve of the direction being
> taken here, but judging from your internal discussions this seems to be
> the way we want to go as a project, in which case clear language is
> undoubtedly better than vague commitments that sound nice but may
> set unrealistic expectations.
>
> --Ray
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