CGI Studio 3.4.0

• Candera V3.4.0
• Candera/FeatStd CMake Build System Changes
• Candera Engine 3D
• Candera Engine 2D
• Candera Base
• Candera Scripting
• Candera System
• Candera Device
• Candera Transitions
• Candera Globalization
• TextEngine
• Candera Widgets
• Candera Monitor
• Candera V3.4.0.1
• Courier V3.4.0
• Courier V3.4.0
• Courier V3.4.0.1
• FeatStd V3.4.0
• FeatStd Util
• FeatStd Monitor
• FeatStd V3.4.0.1
• Analyzer V3.4.0
• Frame Debugger
• SceneComposer V3.4.0
• SceneComposer Usability Improvements

Candera V3.4.0

Candera/FeatStd CMake Build System Changes

Added flags:

 

Candera Engine 3D

Uniformbuffers for Light and Material

Candera Light and Material parameters are now passed as uniform buffers to shaders whenever possible. The Candera reference shader include files have been updated so that any existing shader using Candera's Light and/or Material automatically benefits from this new feature without any change necessary. The Renderer::Statistics has been enhanced by the number of instantiated uniform buffer objects and the number of uniform buffer objects that were updated.

Renderer Statistics Overlay

This feature enables the user to draw renderer statistics data into a render target for diagnostic purposes. A common case would be to draw it every frame after rendering all objects so that it constitutes an overlay presenting relevant rendering data to the user in realtime. The color of the overlay's text and values can be configured separately, as well es the properties of the appearance used to draw the overlay. Added the ability to draw only parts of a VertexBuffer to RenderDevice.

New 3D Animation Property Setters

New animation property setters have been implemented for the Viewport (Camera::GetViewport) and ScissorRectangle (Camera::GetScissorRectangle) properties of a Camera object from a 3D Scene. The corresponding classes for these are Animation::CameraViewportPropertySetter and Animation::CameraScissorRectanglePropertySetter.

A new animation property setter has been implemented also for the vertex rectangle property of renderable canvas objects. The corresponding class for this is Animation::CanvasVertexRectanglePropertySetter.

Transform Feedback

Candera 3.4.0 supports transform feedback on OpenGL ES3.0 platforms. This feature enables the user to utilize the vertex processing unit of the GPU to perform calculations and reuse the results. This can be used for debugging vertex transformations, speed up particle systems, or reuse skinned mesh data for physics calculations.

Pixel Buffer Objects

Candera 3.4.0 supports pixel buffer objects on OpenGL ES3.0 platforms. This feature can be used transfer data to and from video memory asynchronously. The Renderer::Statistics has been enhanced by the number of instantiated pixel buffer objects.

Submesh

This version introduces the ability to draw a subset of a vertex buffer.

RenderMode Rasterizer Discard

The RenderMode now offers an option to discard rasterization. This means that vertex shaders are processed while fragment shaders are not. This is useful in conjunction with transform feedback. This feature is OpenGL ES3.0 only.

Hashes for RenderOrderBin Comparison

During runtime, the RenderOrderBins have been compared via String compare, which is very time consuming, especially if long names are used that differ only in the last letters. To reduce CPU time, hashes are used now (instead of IDs in order to not break the existing interface).

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Candera Engine 2D

Custom Effect Set

It is now possible to configure the list of Effects needed from an external source. For information on how to integrate this feature please refer to Custom Effect Set.

New 2D Animation Property Setters

New animation property setters have been implemented for the Viewport (Camera2D::GetViewport) and ScissorRectangle (Camera2D::GetScissorRectangle) properties of a Camera2D object. The corresponding classes for these are Animation::Camera2DViewportPropertySetter and Animation::Camera2DScissorRectanglePropertySetter.

New animation property setters have been implemented also for BoundingRectangle and ClippingRectangle properties of a Node2D object. The corresponding classes for these are Animation::Node2DBoundingRectanglePropertySetter and Animation::Node2DClippingRectanglePropertySetter.

A new animation property setter has been implemented also for the Layout Margin property of 2D nodes. The corresponding class for this is Animation::LayoutMarginsPropertySetter.

New Math2D Functions

Math2D::TransformScreenToWorld accepts a camera object and a position in screen space. It returns the corresponding position in the world space.
Math2D::TransformScreenToObject accepts a camera object, a position in screen space and an object. It returns the corresponding position in the provided object's space.

Option to inherit the Layout Direction or to use the Culture

Previously the AutomaticDirection resulted in an inherited layout direction.
As a consequence the layout stayed fix at either left-to-right or right-to-left once a specific layout direction has been choosen on a node for the complete sub tree.

Hence, two additional options for the layout direction have been introduced:

Now it is possible to change the setting again to the culture specific layout direction. For backward compatibility the AutomaticDirection will be by default interpreted as InheritDirection.

GridLayouter effective Row/Column Data

Effective grid row/column data access interface has been added to GridLayouter.

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Candera Base

Dynamic Properties: Code Size Reduction

New macros have been introduced to reduce the code size by moving dynamic property code to implementation files. The new macros are used already in Layouter classes.

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Candera Scripting

Lua Update

Lua has been updated to version 5.3.4.

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Candera System

Screenshot-Tool

Candera has a tool to create screenshots now. It is currently only available when 3D is enabled and OpenGL (ES) 3.0 is in use. The screenshot tool has an event listener which will be fired as soon as the screenshot is done. For more advanced usages on how to override the behavior, please have a look in the API.

SizeType Datatype

FeatStd::SizeType can now be used as widget property type for 32 and 64 bit targets.

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Candera Device

RenderTarget events

RenderTarget now supports attaching listeners for catching events before and after SwapBuffers is called.

RenderDevice::ActivateShader deprecated

RenderDevice::ActivateShader has been deprecated. Renderer::ActivateShader shall be used instead.

TextBrush Line Spacing in Pixels/Factor of Height

A flag has been added to TextBrush for line spacing. When this is set to true, line spacing will be in pixels. When this is set to false, line spacing will be a factor by which TextRendering::Metrics::lineHeight from TextRendering::Style::GetMetrics() is multiplied.

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Candera Transitions

New Default Transition Type

The transition framework now supports triggering of animations that can be defined via Transitions::Hint parameters.

Reverse Transition

It is now possible to trigger reverse transitions. In case reversible fragments are identified, the already running transition fragments will go reverse, from their current state to their original one. An optional flag has been added to the Transitions::Rule to specify whether it shall be allowed to reverse a transition or not. Default value is false. A Transitions::OnReverseTransitionFragment corresponding event notifier has been added.

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Candera Globalization

CultureChangeListener Callbacks

New methods have been added to Globalization::CultureChangeListener which are called before and after the culture has been changed.

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TextEngine

Language Dependent Fonts

Extended the TextRendering::Style to support language dependent fonts. A style can change the font to a culture dependent font when the culture has been changed. Further information can be found in the Changelog entry of SceneComposer and the TextRendering::Style documentation.

Alignment Behavior

The TextEngine provides a flag with TextRendering::LayoutingOptions::IsOrientationRealignmentEnabled to switch between different solutions in case of a text which is too long for the maximum width. This flag decides which part of the text will be clipped in cases of centered or right-aligned texts. The flag provides two choices:

The TextNode2D handles this by using the first solution when text trimming is disabled and the second one when it is enabled.

Minor Changes

Further optimized the visual output of justified text. And fixed some alignment issues.

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Candera Widgets

More Property Types for Animations

It is now possible to animate widget properties of Rectangle and Margin types. Also, properties of Vector4 type for widgets are now supported and can be animated. Access to the properties by specifying an index has been added.

Widget MetaInfo Improvements

Candera Monitor

Frame Debugger

Extended Monitor with the ability to capture frames and events.

Captured data includes frame timeline with important events (rendered nodes, camera, OpenGL calls) and color/depth/stencil buffer for selected nodes.

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Candera V3.4.0.1

Release Info

 

Courier V3.4.0

Courier V3.4.0

Release Info

Changes

Changes part of Patch Releases

3.4.0-1 New Animation Property Setters support

Support for the new animation property setters from Candera have been added also in Courier. Thus, following property setters are also handled in Courier:

3.4.0-2 New DelayedUnload Message

A new Courier message has been introduced, Courier::DelayedUnloadMsg, for delayed unload requests.

Courier::ViewHandler stores the request in a vector for further processing in the Render method.

Whenever a delayed unload request counter reaches zero, a Courier::LoadReqMsg is posted to unload the view in the next loop iteration.

If the creation or post of the Courier::LoadReqMsg fails (e.g. due to too many concurrent Courier::LoadReqMsg) then the next iteration will retry the unload. By using the Courier::LoadReqMsg for the unload itself, a Courier::LoadResMsg will be returned.

3.4.0-3 Support for Animation Transitions

Internal class Courier::CanderaTransitionHandler has been enhanced by new methods. This will further by used the the Transitions Framework for running Candera Animations.

New Getter/Setter methods added to set a Candera::Animation::AnimationTimeDispatcher for Candera Transitions.

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Courier V3.4.0.1

Release Info

 

FeatStd V3.4.0

FeatStd Util

SizeType Traits

FeatStd::SizeType can now be used as widget property type for 64 bit target builds as well.

StringBufferAppender 64Bit Support

FeatStd::StringBufferAppender has been extended in order to fully support x86 and x64 targets.

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FeatStd Monitor

Extensions for Frame Debugger and Memory Pool

Extended FeatStd Monitor to support frame debugger. Refactored parts of Memory Pool Monitor.

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FeatStd V3.4.0.1

Release Info

 

Analyzer V3.4.0

Frame Debugger

Added “Frame Debugger” which can be used to capture frames and events. Captured data includes frame timeline with important events (rendered nodes, camera, OpenGL calls) and color/depth/stencil buffer for selected nodes.

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SceneComposer V3.4.0

SceneComposer Usability Improvements

Easy Mode Generator

A configuration file will allow the user to set values that will overwrite the default value from the ApplicationConfig file when  SceneComposer starts. This file can be generated by using the "SceneComposerConfigurator.exe".

In this way, it can be set which object properties are to be presented in SceneComposer's property grid, "Preferences", and all existing dynamic properties (Polarion CGI1-15841, CGI-15842 & CGI-16101).

The configuration applies to all static object properties. The user can rule for dynamic properties like widgets, behaviours, controls. The configuration of widgets, behaviours and controls cannot be extracted/generated automatically.

The configuration values which can be set are:

Language Dependent Fonts

Until now, the fonts could be configured based exclusively on unicode ranges. Since this version on, it will be possible to configure the fonts on the basis of language. So, the configuration is extended in such a way that the font selection can be also conditioned by language ISO codes (the standardized nomenclature used to classify languages).

The text style entries are grouped by culture (multiple). Every text style has - similar to "Entries" - a "Culture" list and every culture from this list has its own "Entries" list. In this way all the text style entries are grouped - as mentioned above - by culture (Polarion CGI1-15719).

SceneComposer Icon in Windows Taskbar

Like any other application, SceneComposer has the ability to be pinned/unpinned to Windows taskbar (Mantis 5950).

Autosave Improvements

New buttons were added to allow backups to be deleted and renamed from the options dialog. At the same time, before creating a backup the current solution gets saved (Mantis 8111).

Transitions

The previously added feature of scene transition editor was completely re-done (Polarion CGI1-15898, CGI1-15858, CGI1-15885, CGI1-16195 etc.). Since now on two different panels are available to set and use transitions:

In addition to cut, fade, slide and scale transitions - or combinations of these - a new build-in transition type was added: Animation. By using it is possible to trigger animations or group animations within transitions.

Control Node Animations

SceneComposer 3.3.1 displays local animations (Control node animations) and plays them, but does not offer any possibility of including them in Animation Groups (Polarion CGI1-15885). Since this version on, the "Local animations" are renamed "Control animations". The command by add animations into an animation group has been split in two distinct and self-explanatory commands (available in the context menu):

Another related features:

Animation Property Setter

A new animation property was implemented for:

When selecting from the context menu "Add Animated Property" on any of the mentioned items, the new property - ViewPort, ScissorRectangle, and SetVertexRactangle - will appear on the drop down box. After selecting it and pressing "OK", an entry will be added in the Animation Values (Animation Design mode) and two key frames will be automatically created (Polarion: CGI1-15990, CGI1-15991 & CGI1-15992).

Renaming Clones and Nodes

When cloning (or pasting a node) the name of the new node will automatically check if there is already a number at the end of the name. If there is a number this should be increased automatically.

For instance, if an existing "Node_1" (or "Node1") is cloned the name of the clone will be "Node_2" (or "Node2") and not "Node_1_1" (or "Node1_1").

The duplication of the item names is incremented based on the numeric suffix with our without an "_" separator (Mantis 7603).

Behavior Indicator

An overlay icon was added for nodes containing one or more behavior elements. In this way it is easier to find those nodes which use behaviours (Mantis 8007).

Shifting Animations Keyframes

A checkbox - "Snap when shifting animation keyframes" - was added to allow the setting of the snap shifting animation keyframes to increment of 5. The checkbox is available in "Preferences" panel, section "Animations" (Mantis 7410).

Export Dependency List

A new button was added - in the "Graph Dependencies" panel - to allow the user to export the "Dependency Graph" as an .xml file with nodes based on items types and names. To use this option, the user has to choose the references graph to be shown (Mantis 8487).

Live Data Preview - Courier Extension

SceneComposer was extended to allow an advanced usage of Courier plugin (Polarion CGI1-15850, CGI1-15849). More detailed, it offers different functions and improvements:

The user, when working with Courier, can define the data items and link them to widget/control properties via data binding.

Uniform Buffer Object Support

OpenGL ES3.0 introduces Uniform Buffer Objects (UBOs). To adress this issue in SceneComposer two changes have been done (Polarion CGI1-15481):

Minor Improvements