Gaffer 1.5.0.0 alpha 1

[johnhaddon]

Note : Gaffer 1.5 marks the end of provision of GCC 9 builds on Linux. Use Gaffer 1.4 if you require GCC 9 builds.

Features

• MergeMeshes, MergePoints, MergeCurves : Added nodes for merging various primitive types.

Improvements

• CameraTweaks : Added ignoreMissing plug to align behaviour with the other Tweaks nodes.
• AttributeTweaks : The {source} substitution for linkedLights now expands to defaultLights if the attribute doesn't exist yet. This makes tweaks such as ({source}) - unwantedLights reliable even if no light links have been authored yet.
• ImageReader : Non-standard "r", "g", "b" and "a" channel names are now automatically renamed to "R", "G", "B" and "A" on loading. As with other heuristics, this can be disabled by setting channelInterpretation to "EXR Specification".
• Metadata : Metadata registered to a node or plug targeting a descendant plug will now override metadata registered locally to the target.
• OptionTweaks, ContextVariableTweaks : Added Remove mode.
• Premultiply, Unpremultiply :
  • Added ignoreMissingAlpha plug.
  • Optimised the pass-through of the alpha channel.
• GraphGadget :
  • Improved highlighting of active nodes, with more accurate tracking of Loop node iterations.
  • Annotation {plug} substitutions are now evaluated in a context determined relative to the focus node.
  • The strike-through for disabled nodes is now evaluated in a context determined relative to the focus node.
  • Custom dot labels are now evaluated in a context determined relative to the focus node.
• LightEditor :
  • Improved formatting of column headers containing whitespace.
  • The "Double-click to toggle" tooltip is no longer displayed while hovering over non-editable cells, and a "Double-click to edit" tooltip is now displayed while hovering over other non-toggleable but editable cells.
• Spreadsheet : Added yellow underlining to the currently active row.
• PlugLayout : Summaries and activators are now evaluated in a context determined relative to the focus node.
• Editor : The node graph is now evaluated in a context determined relative to the focus node.
• LightEditor, RenderPassEditor : The "Disable Edit" right-click menu item and D shortcut now act as a toggle, where edits disabled in the current session via these actions can be reenabled with D or by selecting "Reenable Edit" from the right-click menu.
• EditScope : Setting a Viewer or Editor's target edit scope to "None" will now prevent edits from being made within any upstream edit scope. To make edits in an edit scope, it must be set as the target.
• FreezeTransform :
  • Improved performance for large meshes by using multithreading.
  • Improved UI responsiveness by supporting cancellation of long computes.

Fixes

• Editor : Fixed Internal C++ object already deleted errors when some editors were destroyed.
• UVInspector : Fixed Unable to find ScriptNode for UVView warnings.
• Scene Editors : Fixed update when ScenePlugs are added to or removed from the node being viewed.
• PrimitiveInspector : Fixed failure to update when the location being viewed ceases to exist, or is recreated.
• Shuffle, ShuffleAttributes, ShufflePrimitiveVariables : Fixed some special cases where shuffling a source to itself would fail to have the expected effect.
• GraphEditor :
  • Fixed dimming of labels for BoxIn and BoxOut nodes.
  • Fixed update of custom context-sensitive labels on Dot nodes.
• GafferCortexUI : Removed usage of legacy PlugValueWidget API.
• Dispatcher : Fixed crashes caused by a dispatcher's SetupPlugsFn attempting to access the TaskNode it was being called for. Dispatchers may now introspect the TaskNode and add different plugs based on type (Reconsider Dispatcher::setupPlugs() mechanism #915).
• ArrayPlug :
  • Fixed error when resize() removed plugs with input connections.
  • Fixed error when resize() was used on an output plug.
• CreateViews : Fixed redundant serialisation of internal connections.
• LightEditor, RenderPassEditor : Removed ambiguous The selected cells cannot be edited in the current Edit Scope message when attempting to edit non-editable columns, such as the Name column.
• SetEditor : Fixed right-click to ensure the item under the cursor is selected before the menu is shown.
• PrimitiveInspector :
  • Fixed bug which prevented cancellation of long-running computes, making the UI unresponsive until they completed.
  • Fixed thread-safety bug.
• HierarchyView, SetEditor : Fixed thread-safety bugs.
• FreezeTransform : Constant primitive variables with point/vector interpretations are now also transformed.
• usdview : Added Windows support (Can't launch usdview on Windows #5599).
• ContextTracker : Removed unnecessary reference increment/decrement from isTracked(), context() and isEnabled().
• Menu : Fixed bug causing a menu item's tooltip to not hide when moving the cursor to another menu item without a tooltip.
• Python : Fixed startup failures caused by conflicting Python modules in the user site-packages directory.

API

• Editor :
  • Added settings() method, which returns a node hosting plugs specifying settings for the editor.
  • Added _updateFromSettings() method, which is called when a subclass should update to reflect changes to the settings.
• SceneEditor : Added new base class to simplify the creation of scene-specific editors.
• PlugValueWidget :
  • A DeprecationWarning is now emitted for any subclasses still implementing the legacy _updateFromPlug() or _updateFromPlugs() methods. Implement _updateFromValues(), _updateFromMetadata() and _updateFromEditable() instead.
  • A DeprecationWarning is now emitted by _plugConnections(). Use _blockedUpdateFromValues() instead.
  • Added scriptNode() convenience method.
• NodeGadget, ConnectionGadget : Added updateFromContextTracker() virtual methods.
• Path : Added inspectionContext() virtual method.
• PathColumn :
  • Added contextMenuSignal(), allowing the creation of custom context menus.
  • Added instanceCreatedSignal(), providing an opportunity to connect to the signals on any column, no matter how it is created.
  • Added keyPressSignal() and keyReleaseSignal(), allowing a PathColumn to handle key events.
• ArrayPlug :
  • It is now legal to construct an ArrayPlug with a minimum size of 0. Previously the minimum size was 1.
  • Added elementPrototype() method.
• View : Added scriptNode() method.
• VisibleSet : Added Python constructor with keyword arguments for expansions, inclusions and exclusions.
• ScriptNodeAlgo : Added new namespace with functions for managing shared UI state for GafferSceneUI.
• ContextAlgo : Deprecated. Use ScriptNodeAlgo instead.
• ContextTracker : Added support for plugs in Views and Editor.Settings nodes, which should use the tracked context for the node being viewed.

Breaking Changes

• CameraTweaks : Replace mode now errors if the input parameter does not exist. Use Create mode or the new ignoreMissing plug instead.
• TweakPlug : Remove deprecated MissingMode::IgnoreOrReplace.
• AttributeTweaks : Replace mode no longer errors if the linkedLights attribute doesn't exist.
• ImageReader : Changed handling of lower-cased "r", "g", "b" and "a" channels.
• Metadata : Path based registrations to a Node or Plug now override equivalent registrations on its descendants.
• TweakPlugValueWidget : Removed support for tweakPlugValueWidget:allowCreate and tweakPlugValueWidget:allowRemove metadata.
• Editor : Removed arguments from Settings constructor.
• Unpremultiply : Removed image:channelName from the context used to evaluate the alphaChannel plug.
• Shuffle, ShuffleAttributes, ShufflePrimitiveVariables : Changed behaviour when shuffling a source to itself.
• Editor, NodeToolbar, PlugLayout, PlugValueWidget :
  • Removed setContext() methods.
  • Deprecated getContext() methods. Use context() instead.
• Loop : Removed nextIterationContext() method.
• NodeGadget, ConnectionGadget : Removed activeForFocusNode() virtual methods. Override updateFromContextTracker() instead.
• ArrayPlug :
  • Renamed element constructor argument to elementPrototype.
  • Deprecated the passing of element = nullptr to the constructor.
• View :
  • Changed constructor arguments for View and all subclasses. A ScriptNode must now be passed.
  • Changed ViewCreator signature.
  • Removed contextChanged() and contextChangedConnection() methods.
  • Removed setContext() and getContext() methods. Use context() instead of getContext().
  • The contextChangedSignal() is now emitted for all changes to the context, whereas previously it was only emitted by setContext(). This simplifies context handling in Tools, which no longer need to connect to Context::changedSignal() as well.
• LightTool : Removed selection() and selectionChangedSignal().
• ArnoldRender, CyclesRender, DelightRender, OpenGLRender : Removed. Use the generic Render node instead.
• Render : Removed protected constructor for creating renderer-specific derived classes.
• Signal : The connect() and connectFront() methods now default to scoped = False. If a scoped connection is required, pass scoped = True.
• FreezeTransform : Constant primitive variables with point/vector interpretations are now also transformed (this is more correct, but it is a change in behaviour).
• ImageGadget : Remove non-const variant of getContext().
• LazyMethod : deferUntilPlaybackStops now requires that the Widget has a scriptNode() method rather than a context() method.
• Python : Gaffer now disables the user site-packages directory by setting PYTHONNOUSERSITE=1. To revert to the previous behaviour, set PYTHONNOUSERSITE=0 before launching Gaffer.

Build

• Cycles :
  • Updated to version 4.2.0.
  • Disabled CUDA binary generation for Kepler and Maxwell architecture GPUs.
• Embree : Updated to version 4.3.2.
• Imath : Updated to version 3.1.11.
• LibJPEG-Turbo : Updated to version 3.0.3.
• MaterialX : Updated to version 1.38.10.
• OpenImageIO : Updated to version 2.5.10.1.
• OpenPGL : Updated to version 0.6.0.
• PySide : Updated to version 5.15.14.
• Qt : Updated to version 5.15.14.
• USD : Updated to version 24.08.
• Zstandard : Added version 1.5.0.
• Windows : Update compiler to Visual Studio 2022 / MSVC 17.8 / Runtime library 14.3.

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This discussion was created from the release Gaffer 1.5.0.0 alpha 1.