Ubuntu Manpage: Inventor - a toolkit for writing 3D programs

Provided by: inventor-clients_2.1.5-10-24_amd64

NAME

       Inventor - a toolkit for writing 3D programs

DESCRIPTION

The Open Inventor 3D Toolkit is an object-oriented toolkit that simplifies and abstracts the task of
writing graphics programming into a set of easy to use objects. These objects range from low-level data-
centered objects such as Sphere, Camera, Material, Light, and Group, to high-level application-level
objects such as Walk Viewer and Material Editor. The foundation concept in Inventor is the "scene
database" which defines the objects to be used in an application. When using Inventor, a programmer
creates, edits, and composes these objects into hierarchical 3D scene graphs (i.e. database). A variety
of fundamental application tasks such as rendering, picking, event handling, and file reading/writing are
built-in operations of all objects in the database and thus are simple to invoke.

Since Inventor is object-oriented (written in C++), it encourages programmers to extend the system by
writing new objects. Inventor users have created a variety of new objects that are not included in the
product, such as: Bezier surfaces, CSG objects, animation objects, special viewers, and many more.

Note that the rendering mechanism inside Inventor objects employs OpenGL. Thus, during rendering each
object automatically makes the proper, efficient calls to OpenGL. Furthermore, Inventor rendering
supports a caching scheme which automatically generates very fast renderings of the database without
traversal overheads.

Inventor picking is extremely efficient and does not utilize rendering. Furthermore, picking returns a
variety of 3D information and detail about what objects were picked. A sorted list of picked objects and
corresponding information is returned to the programmer. Picking is so fast that programs can perform 3D
locate highlighting as the mouse moves across a 3D window.

INTERACTION, EVENTS, AND DEVICES

       Inventor defines a event model for writing 3D interaction.  This model is window system independent.   It
       is  quite easy to use and makes 3D direct manipulation programming possible.  Inventor includes a variety
       of interactive 3D objects and tools for writing interactive objects, such as: Manipulators, Draggers, and
       Projectors.   The flexible event model encourages programmers to extend the system to support new devices
       and event types.

FILE FORMAT

       The Inventor 3D File Format is SGI's standard for 3D data.  The format supports both an ASCII and private
       binary format.  The binary format is network-neutral and thus can be exported across machine boundaries.

BENEFITS

       Programming  3D  graphics applications with Inventor results in large-scale productivity increases.  This
       also increases with time as more tools utilize the Inventor paradigm, user interfaces, and standard  file
       format.

DOCUMENTATION

       A  list  of  online documentation is available in the General FAQ section of the web site provided at the
       end of this man page.

SOURCE CODE

       The Inventor Toolkit includes source code to NUMEROUS programs and examples.