[ViewVC] Diff of: Development/ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes

Comparing ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes (file contents):
Revision 1.416 by greg, Thu Jul 14 02:52:02 2022 UTC vs.
Revision 1.498 by greg, Sat Sep 13 17:54:39 2025 UTC

+the sun is not visible above the horizon.
+=========================
-<
+Version 5.4
->
+Version 5.4 (Released November 5, 2023)
+Added rcollate -c option to force operation to continue even if it
+seems unnecessary.  Made tool more robust.
+Updated Klems Half- and Quarter-bases to match angles currently used
+in WINDOW.
-+
-+
+Eliminated most aiming failures for triangular light sources, at the
-+
+expense of conservative sampling near the centroid.  Thanks to
-+
+David Geisler-Moroder for his help on this.
-+
-+
+Increased maximum set size to 8191 to avoid set overflow errors.
-+
-+
+Added source obstruction test to statistics being kept on which
-+
+sources were visible in adaptive shadow testing code.  Previous
-+
+behavior was likely over-estimating source contributions.
-+
-+
+Added diffuse components into maximum directional hemispherical
-+
+reported by checkBSDF, so comparing to 100% is easier for each
-+
+component.
-+
-+
+Fixed incorrect calculations in iso2klems script, thanks to
-+
+help from Jacob Jonnson.
-+
-+
+Updated official copyright and license according to new wording
-+
+provided by Jean Haemmerle at the LBNL Intellectual Property Office.
-+
+Both were copied verbatim from e-mail I received from Taoning Wang
-+
+on 8/20/2022.
-+
-+
+Added -features option to rpict, rtrace, and rcontrib to check
-+
+which features are present or look for specific feature support.
-+
+This addition was suggested by Peter Apian-Bennewitz as an easier
-+
+way to determine which version of Radiance is installed and what
-+
+it supports, and is timely as we begin our refactoring of the
-+
+rendering code.  There are no current plans to add this to rvu.
-+
-+
+Added falsecolor -odim, -orct, and -c0 options to overlay grid of
-+
+values on image.  This was requested by Rob Shakespeare.
-+
-+
+Added -i* and -o* options in rhcopy for reading rays from the
-+
+standard input and writing rays from holodeck to standard output.
-+
+This will hopefully be useful in combining rholo with rcontrib.
-+
-+
+Added further checking for coincident (overlapping) flat surfaces,
-+
+preferring front sides to back sides in the ray intersection
-+
+calculation.  This only applies to rings and faces, as the other
-+
+surface types would have required additional calculations to
-+
+make them work.  Material transparency is still the primary
-+
+consideration, now followed by ray hit side, followed by
-+
+modifier definition order in the input.
-+
-+
+Increased octree and object limits to allow scenes with billions
-+
+of primitives.
-+
-+
+Made reciprocity averaging default to "off" in bsdf2ttree, as it seems
-+
+to create more problems than it solves.
-+
-+
+====================
-+
+Version 6.0 (Released July 23, 2025)
-+
-+
+Extensive changes to enable spectral rendering, which defaults to "off"
-+
+to maintain backwards-compatibility with previous versions, with the
-+
+exception of the ambient file format, which is changed.  The MAXCSAMP
-+
+macro, which defaults to 24, sets the maximum number of spectral samples.
-+
+The actual number of samples is set by the "-cs" option, which defaults
-+
+to 3 for rpict, rtrace, and rcontrib.  The latter two programs support
-+
+straight spectral output, but rpict is initially restricted to
-+
+tristimulus output pictures.  New pattern primitives "spectrum",
-+
+"specfile", and "specfunc" have been added as a means to specify
-+
+spectral reflectance, emittance, etc. to materials that still have
-+
+only 3 color channels.  Those RGB channels will still affect the
-+
+spectrum if used.  Unfortunately photon-mapping is currently broken when
-+
+spectral sampling is enabled, but we will fix this as soon as possible.
-+
+Calculation overhead appears to be approximately 10-15% for RGB
-+
+renderings compared to version 5.4a.
-+
-+
+Added spectral rendering to rvu as well, and made -cs and -cw
-+
+options standard across the rendering library.  I also brought
-+
+mkillum, ranimove, rsensor, and mksource into the fold.  These
-+
+tools were broken in the initial release.  (Hopefully, they are
-+
+working now, but none have been tested as yet.)
-+
+There was also an indexing bug in the spectral->RGB conversions
-+
+that made reds into blues and vice versa, which has been fixed.
-+
-+
+Added i/o for spectral pictures to rmtxop, the first program that can
-+
+ingest them.  (Only rtrace, rcontrib, and rfluxmtx can render them.)
-+
+New symbolic rmtxop -c options, such as RGB, XYZ, S (for scotopic)
-+
+and M (for melanopic) make color conversions simpler.  Alternatively,
-+
+a reference matrix or picture may be given and the color space of
-+
+that file will be used.  The -C option takes either a symbolic
-+
+color space or reference file and is "sticky," so it applies to
-+
+all subsequent input files that do not have their own -c right ahead
-+
+of them.
-+
-+
+Added spectral picture support to rcrop and radcompare.
-+
-+
+Added new utility, rcomb, which is something like a combination
-+
+of rmtxop and pcomb, it works with all the inputs and
-+
+outputs that rmtxop handles, but allows for general expressions
-+
+like those in pcomb for putting matrices together, working on
-+
+an element at a time.  (No resizing of matrices or accessing
-+
+neighboring elements, as permitted in pcomb.)  It saves memory
-+
+over rmtxop by operating on a row at a time, so can handle
-+
+input and output matrices with any number of rows.  It does
-+
+provide for a single matrix-multiplication operation at the end,
-+
+which only requires memory for that final matrix.
-+
-+
+Added support for filtering hyperspectral images to pfilt.
-+
-+
+Added support for 1- and 3-component float matrix i/o to
-+
+pcomb to allow for better interoperability.
-+
-+
+Added support for -co+ option to rtpict, so it can directly
-+
+produce hyperspectral images.
-+
-+
+Added new "specdata" and "specpict" primitives to support
-+
+interpolated spectral data files and hyperspectral images
-+
+as patterns.
-+
-+
+Added support for multispectal sampling in rsensor, which will
-+
+put out as many color channels as specified in any -cs option
-+
+(default is 3 for RGB).
-+
-+
+Added ability of mgf2rad to convert spectral data at least
-+
+for light, glow, plastic, and metal primitive types.  Need
-+
+to use new '-s' option to get new output.  Added support for
-+
+new WGMDfunc type as well, which is considerably more flexible
-+
+at supporting different spectral components.
-+
-+
+Added handling of spectral pictures (HSR) to rcode2bmp script.
-+
-+
+Minor change to rcollate to allow explicit byte records to
-+
+be any specified length without checks against header input.
-+
-+
+Added new hemisphere type to rfluxmtx, "h=cie" for CIE sky
-+
+scanner positions.  These are 145 patches with identical
-+
+row counts to Tregenza, but starting from a different
-+
+azimuth and reversing row directions at adjacent altitudes.
-+
-+
+Added optimization for long argument lists and arrays in
-+
+the calcomp routines used for rendering and in rcalc, etc.
-+
-+
+Added error estimate spreading to ambient super-sampling
-+
+algorithm (-as) to improve performance especially in
-+
+scenes with sharp cut-offs.
-+
-+
+Added -i option to gendaymtx to match -i option of gendaylit.
-+
+Thanks to Yongqing for initial implementation.
-+
-+
+Changed rcrop so negative #rows or #cols counts back from end.
-+
-+
+Added rcomb -n option for multi-processing of very large matrices.
-+
-+
+Made it so rsplit and rlam can handle any number of input files
-+
+up to active open file descriptor limit.
-+
-+
+Taoning Wang added genssky tool for generating spectral sky
-+
+descriptions.
-+
-+
+Taoning added gensdaymtx utility based on gendaymtx, and
-+
+added epw2wea -a option to include required information.
-+
-+
+Fixed bug introduced in Auguest 2022 (5.4 release) in distant
-+
+light source sampling, which caused aiming failures.  (Thanks
-+
+to Mike DiPompeo of LightStanza for reporting the issue.)
-+
-+
+Added rxpict rendering tool based on C++ RpictSimulManager class.
-+
+Multi-processing and spectral output are supported.
-+
-+
+Wrote rxpiece tool that will render pictures using tiling and
-+
+can handle different output formats and hyperspectral pictures.
-+
+Only runs on a single machine, however -- no NFS locking on
-+
+shared volumes.  Mainly a demonstration tool for RpictSimulManager
-+
+C++ class, but later added to standard Rmakefile targets.
-+
-+
+Fixed a bug in BSDF sampling of sources pointed out by
-+
+David Geisler-Moroder, which tended to overestimate specular
-+
+contributions for some BSDFs.
-+
-+
+Added crude ability to read and convert spectra to RGB in ximage,
-+
+ra_bmp, ra_ps, and ra_rgbe programs.  Also updated fast tone-mapping
-+
+library to handle spectral HSR inputs at the same time.  HSR
-+
+input handling was added in a similar fashion to pcond and pvalue
-+
+for convenience.
-+
-+
+Added handling of hyperspectral images to normtiff, a handy program
-+
+for quickly tone-mapping Radiance RGBE, XYZE, and now hyperspectral
-+
+pictures, as well as IEEE float or LogLuv TIFFs.
-+
-+
+Added handling of hyperspectral pictures to pextrem, though
-+
+results are still reported in RGB.
-+
-+
+Added accurate conversion of hyperspectral pictures to ra_xyze.
-+
-+
+Added hyperspectral picture conversion to ra_tiff, with accurate
-+
+color when targeting 16-bit/comp., LogLuv, and float output,
-+
+and the approximate method for 24-bit RGB.
-+
-+
+Taoning added genssky -L option to specify global and diffuse
-+
+illuminance values for output calibration.
-+
-+
+Created C++ class for rcontrib and example tool rxcontrib, which
-+
+is an optional compile in the src/rt directory.  The output
-+
+model is more general in some respects and the operations more
-+
+efficient, but standard output is not supported, nor is ASCII
-+
+results data.
-+
-+
+Added strnstr.c compatibility module in ray/src/common, since
-+
+it isn't present on Linux derivatives.
-+
-+
+Added WGMDfunc material type with programmable roughness and
-+
+separate modifier paths for the different components.
-+
-+
+Added gensurf -i option at the request of Peter Apian-Bennewitz
-+
+to reverse surface normals, mostly for data input, when it is
-+
+a bit more difficult to adjust.
-+
-+
+Added rad -N option to rholo call for multiprocessing when
-+
+mkillum and/or mkpmap are involved in octree prep.
-+
-+
+Added ability of gendaymtx to read EPW as well as WEA files.
-+
+When EPW input is provided, the 3-hour average dew point is
-+
+used to compute a more accurate precipitable water content
-+
+value.  It currently does not use these data directly from
-+
+the EPW input, relying instead on a dew-point-to-W calculation.
-+
+This follows the request and recommendations of David G-M.
-+
-+
+Removed limitation in rfluxmtx, which was disallowing distant
-+
+and local receivers. Found this to be a perfectly valid approach
-+
+for some annual daylighting scenarios.
-+
-+
+Wrote new pvsum tool to handle cases dctimestep can't, like
-+
+spectral input pictures.  It also adds a -N option for multi-
-+
+processing on Unix machines, which utilizes memory-mapped
-+
+inputs for efficient i/o sharing.
-+
-+
+Made it so genBSDF can use spectral rendering for a
-+
+more accurate photometric result.
-+
-+
+Changed default matrix representation to float rather than
-+
+double, which uses less RAM and supports faster operations
-+
+in general.  Build with compiler flag:
-+
+        -DDTnativeDTrmx_native=DTdouble
-+
+to get back higher precision representation.
-+
-+
+Taoning Wang updated genssky and gensdaymtx to provide illuminance
-+
+calibration and accept EPW files directly as input.
-+
-+
+Added -e expr and -f file.cal options to all rendering tools, not
-+
+just rcontrib/rxcontrib.  Feature request from Peter A-B.
-+
-+
+Fixed slight bias in indirect calculation caused by ambient
-+
+collision detection, pointed out by Jon Sargent.  New code
-+
+keeps track of rejected samples and sells them back to
-+
+later calls to get something closer to a true Poisson
-+
+sampling method.
-+
-+
+Altered rvu "origin" command to take shift amounts forward,
-+
+right, and up rather than taking an explicit origin, which
-+
+can be done easily enough with the "view" command.  Peter A-B
-+
+requested (sort of).
-+
-+
+Added genglaze tool created by Taoning Wang to generate
-+
+spectral glazing materials based on CGDB data and models.
-+
-+
+Fixed bug that caused inf and nan errors with -cw setting
-+
+where longer wavelength was substantially less than limits
-+
+of specified spectra.
-+
-+
+Created bsdfpeaks utility to identify and report full-width,
-+
+half-maximum sizes of peaks in SIR and XML inputs.
-+
-+
+Changed default super-sampling in bsdf2ttree from 256 to 64,
-+
+since there doesn't seem to be much benefit to the higher
-+
+sampling rate for most BSDFs.
-+
-+
+Fixed problem with "mirror" primitive, which was not permitting
-+
+indirect rays to transmit through alternate material type.
-+
+Thanks to Jon Sargent for finding problem and help resolving it.
-+
-+
+Added experimental C++ based rxpiece tool to default installation
-+
+in makeall/Rmakefile.
-+
-+
+Added rcomb -mt option to transpose concatenation matrix.
-+
-+
+====================
-+
+Version 6.1 (Released July 24, 2025)
-+
-+
+Fixed array limit bug in EPW file loader.
-+
-+
+Fixed bug in rcomb, rmtxop -c and -C option not accepting file paths
-+
+starting with '.'
-+
-+
+Fixed ordering of spectral data in gensdaymtx output.
-+
-+
+Fixed crash in new Poisson sampling routines for large settings of -ad.
-+
-+
+Fixed reversal of direct and diffuse values in EPW files.  (Thanks to
-+
+Taoning Wang for spotting the error.)
-+
-+
+Fixed issue with zero radiation values in gensdaymtx (TW).
-+
-+
+(The above fixes were released as official patch 6.0.1)
-+
-+
+Fixed issues with rtpict running under Windows.  Thanks to Mehlika
-+
+Inanici for help finding problems and testing.

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Comparing ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes (file contents): Revision 1.416 by greg, Thu Jul 14 02:52:02 2022 UTC vs. Revision 1.498 by greg, Sat Sep 13 17:54:39 2025 UTC

Diff Legend

Comparing ray/doc/notes/ReleaseNotes (file contents):
Revision 1.416 by greg, Thu Jul 14 02:52:02 2022 UTC vs.
Revision 1.498 by greg, Sat Sep 13 17:54:39 2025 UTC