Geometric objects

The geometric objects of Axl can be vizualized in the view, manipulated by the interactors of the view or by the data manager. They share the following attributes, which may appear optionnaly in their description:

  • name (eg. name=”P1”) which specifies the name used for the object;
  • color (e.g. color=”255 0 0 0.5” which specifies the color of the object in red-green-blue enconding (here it is red) and its opacity (a floating point value between 0 and 1).
  • shader which specifies the name of the shader applied to the object.
  • size which describes the pixel size of the curve when this is applicable.

Different types of geometric objects can be used in Axl. They are stored in xml format, with a node indicating their type. Here is an example:

<myobj name="o1" size="0.1" color="255 0 0 0.5">
...
</myobj>

It is defining an object of type myobj named “o1”, of size 0.1, of red color and transparency 0.5. If the shader attribute is used, then the color and transparency values are not taken into account.

The following types of objects can be created and manipulated directly in Axl:

Spline curves, surfaces, volumes

The following objects can be manipulated with the plugin BSplineTools.

  • B-spline curves
  • B-spline surfaces
  • B-spline volumes

Algebraic curves and surfaces

The plugin SemiAlgebraicTools provides the following types of objects: