BI.
The shaderfrom setting in the node editor only makes sense for "new"
shading nodes (cycles), otherwise it should be ignored and default to
SNODE_SHADER_OBJECT.
The effect of this is not visible with standard compositor/shader nodes,
because the editor node tree is immediately set from context afterward
using the scene or active material. But with pynodes the context update
is not necessarily defined and the node tree pointer gets lost.
Adding a new node in Node Editor failed for "High DPI" (Only Mac retina now).
- Py script for adding nodes was doing dpi magic, which it shouldn't. It has
been replaced with a (temporary) API call to set the correct cursor location.
(Thanks to Lukas T for helping here)
- The SpaceNode->cursor[2] property now is *only* storing the coordinate
in "adding new node space". Use of this has been removed from the code where
possible, with as only exception the code to draw noodles while adding them.
Special coder note: Nodes should respect the DPI value, and draw larger with
larger buttons if you increase this size. The hack here is that this can only
work nice if also the node positions are scaled accordingly.
A better fix could be to check on scaling the node view itself for it. That
then would also remove this Python API call that was added in this commit.
However, that again might fight with how buttons layout code works now...
needs some careful checking.
custom pynodes tree edited directly as library data would get a 0 user count on reload and subsequently not be saved. Now the node space follows the same pattern as the image space: the node tree(s) user
count gets incremented on file load and opening in the editor ensures a real user. This leads to 1 "unreal" user for the editor (dropped on reload), but seems to be the only viable solution atm.
node materials.
Area and region listener callbacks now get the screen and area pointers passed, so
they can do more fine grained checks to see if redraw is really needed, for example
depending on the 3D view drawtype.
The design changes coming with pynodes for the node editor allow editing multiple node groups or pinning. This is great for working on different node groups without switching between them all the time, but it causes a problem for viewer nodes: these nodes all write to the same Image data by design, causing access conflicts and in some cases memory corruption. This was not a problem before pynodes because the editor would only allow 1 edited node group at any time. With the new flexibility of node editors this restriction is gone.
In order to avoid concurrent write access to the viewer image buffer and resolve the ambiguity this patch adds an "active viewer key" to the scene->nodetree (added in bNodeTree instead of Scene due to otherwise circular DNA includes). This key identifies a specific node tree/group instance, which enables the compositor to selectively enable only 1 viewer node.
The active viewer key is switched when opening/closing node groups (push/pop on the snode->treepath stack) or when selecting a viewer node. This way only the "last edited" viewer will be active.
Eventually it would be nicer if each viewer had its own buffer per node space so one could actually compare viewers without switching. But that is a major redesign of viewer nodes and images, not a quick fix for bcon4 ...
As some people have already noticed, the "Add" menu for nodes is a bit messy since pynodes merge. The reason for this is that the order of nodes in submenus (categories) was previously defined by the order in which all nodes are registered (at the bottom of blenkernel/intern/node.c). For the dynamic registration of node types now possible this system of defining node order along with registration is no longer viable: while it would still sort of work for C nodes, it is completely meaningless for dynamic (python) nodes, which are basically registered automatically in whatever order modules and addons are loaded, with the added complexity of unloading and reloading.
To fix this problem and add a bunch of desirable features this commit replaces the C menu with a python implementation. The new menu does not rely on any particular order of types in the node registry, but instead uses a simple explicit list of all the available nodes, grouped by categories (in scripts/nodeitems_builtins.py).
There are a number of additional features that become possible with this implementation:
1) Node Toolbar can be populated!
The list of nodes is used to create 2 UI items for each node: 1 entry in a submenu of "Add" menu and 1 item in a node toolbar panel with basically the same functionality. Clicking a button in the toolbar will add a new node of this type, just like selecting an item in the menu. The toolbar has the advantage of having collapsible panels for each category, so users can decide if they don't need certain nodes categories and have the rest more easily accessible.
2) Each node item is a true operator call.
The old Add menu is a pretty old piece of C code which doesn't even use proper operator buttons. Now there is a generic node_add operator which can be used very flexibly for adding any of the available nodes.
3) Node Items support additional settings.
Each "NodeItem" consists of the basic node type plus an optional list of initial settings that shall be applied to a new instance. This gives additional flexibility for creating variants of the same node or for defining preferred initial settings. E.g. it has been requested to disable previews for all nodes except inputs, this would be simple change in the py code and much less intrusive than in C.
4) Node items can be generated with a function.
A callback can be used in any category instead of the fixed list, which generates a set of items based on the context (much like dynamic enum items in bpy.props). Originally this was implemented for group nodes, because these nodes only make sense when linked to a node tree from the library data. This principle could come in handy for a number of other nodes, e.g. Image nodes could provide a similar list of node variants based on images in the library - no need to first add node, then select an image.
WARNING: pynodes scripters will have to rework their "draw_add_menu" callback in node tree types, this has been removed now! It was already pretty redundant, since one can add draw functions to the Add menu just like for any other menu. In the future i'd like to improve the categories system further so scripters can use it for custom node systems too, for now just make a draw callback and attach it to the Add menu.
When nodes are loaded from a .blend file they can potentially have undefined types. This can happen if a type has been deprecated and removed, or if node types were defined in a python script that has not been loaded correctly. Previously all such nodes would automatically be removed from a node tree, assuming that their types were deprecated and no longer in use (more commonly caused by loading new nodes in an older Blender version). Due to the possibility of dynamic registration it is no longer feasible to simply delete such nodes.
Display and handling of node trees was simply disabled before this patch, so that a node tree where any node or socket type was undefined would not be displayed at all. To give more information and avoid problems caused by necessary checks for the typeinfo pointer, there is now a 'Undefined' fallback type for trees, nodes and sockets. These types are used as placeholders in case the real type is not registered and can provide useful visual feedback on undefined nodes.
PyNodes opens up the node system in Blender to scripters and adds a number of UI-level improvements.
=== Dynamic node type registration ===
Node types can now be added at runtime, using the RNA registration mechanism from python. This enables addons such as render engines to create a complete user interface with nodes.
Examples of how such nodes can be defined can be found in my personal wiki docs atm [1] and as a script template in release/scripts/templates_py/custom_nodes.py [2].
=== Node group improvements ===
Each node editor now has a tree history of edited node groups, which allows opening and editing nested node groups. The node editor also supports pinning now, so that different spaces can be used to edit different node groups simultaneously. For more ramblings and rationale see (really old) blog post on code.blender.org [3].
The interface of node groups has been overhauled. Sockets of a node group are no longer displayed in columns on either side, but instead special input/output nodes are used to mirror group sockets inside a node tree. This solves the problem of long node lines in groups and allows more adaptable node layout. Internal sockets can be exposed from a group by either connecting to the extension sockets in input/output nodes (shown as empty circle) or by adding sockets from the node property bar in the "Interface" panel. Further details such as the socket name can also be changed there.
[1] http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/User:Phonybone/Python_Nodes
[2] http://projects.blender.org/scm/viewvc.php/trunk/blender/release/scripts/templates_py/custom_nodes.py?view=markup&root=bf-blender
[3] http://code.blender.org/index.php/2012/01/improving-node-group-interface-editing/
Previous alpha-overing on black for RGB display wasn't so much useful
for artists, changed in a way:
- Made RGBA display default for node editor backdrop and image editor,
so it'll be clear that image does have alpha channel
- RGB display will ignore alpha channel completely
Reshuffled buttons for RGBA/RGB so now the order is following:
RGBA | RGB | Alpha | Z
Still to come: startup.blend shall be altered to make RGBA default.
With the view3d 'Render Only' option, grease pencil wouldn't draw, but for OpenGL render it did.
Since grease pencil can be very useful in opengl renders, enable grease pencil drawing with 'Render Only' option in the viewport,
and add a checkbox in the grease pencil header not to draw (unchecking each layer is annoying and applies to all spaces).
Nice formatted version (pictures soon):
http://wiki.blender.org/index.php/Dev:Ref/Release_Notes/2.66/Usability
Short list of main changes:
- Transparent region option (over main region), added code to blend in/out such panels.
- Min size window now 640 x 480
- Fixed DPI for ui - lots of cleanup and changes everywhere. Icon image need correct size still, layer-in-use icon needs remake.
- Macbook retina support, use command line --no-native-pixels to disable it
- Timeline Marker label was drawing wrong
- Trackpad and magic mouse: supports zoom (hold ctrl)
- Fix for splash position: removed ghost function and made window size update after creation immediate
- Fast undo buffer save now adds UI as well. Could be checked for regular file save even...
Quit.blend and temp file saving use this now.
- Dixed filename in window on reading quit.blend or temp saves, and they now add a warning in window title: "(Recovered)"
- New Userpref option "Keep Session" - this always saves quit.blend, and loads on start.
This allows keeping UI and data without actual saves, until you actually save.
When you load startup.blend and quit, it recognises the quit.blend as a startup (no file name in header)
- Added 3D view copy/paste buffers (selected objects). Shortcuts ctrl-c, ctrl-v (OSX, cmd-c, cmd-v).
Coded partial file saving for it. Could be used for other purposes. Todo: use OS clipboards.
- User preferences (themes, keymaps, user settings) now can be saved as a separate file.
Old option is called "Save Startup File" the new one "Save User Settings".
To visualise this difference, the 'save startup file' button has been removed from user preferences window. That option is available as CTRL+U and in File menu still.
- OSX: fixed bug that stopped giving mouse events outside window.
This also fixes "Continuous Grab" for OSX. (error since 2009)
Rationale is that the sidebar contains some extra detail settings for several node types. Many users don't seem to even know that this feature exists, so making it visible by default should be helpful.
As suggested by Campbell on the IRC gave grease pencil its own notifier type (NC_GPENCIL) and made the makesrna notifier functions actually update properly.
Also got the #ifdef'd GreasePencil.layers.[new/remove] functions working.
Note: While renaming DNA properties is usually dangerous and can break files, in this case it is possible because the mx/my values are only used at runtime.
For an detailed user-level description of new features see the following blogpost:
http://code.blender.org/index.php/2012/05/node-editing-tweaks/
TL;DR:
* Frame node gets more usable bounding-box behavior
* Node resizing has helpful mouse cursor indicators and works on all borders
* Node selection/active colors are themeable independently
* Customizable background colors for nodes (useful for frames visual
distinction).
For premultiplied alpha images, this makes any color space conversion for the image
or render output work on color without alpha multiplied in.
This is typically useful to avoid fringing when the image was or will be composited
over a light background. If the image will be composited over a black background on
the other hand, leaving this option off will give correct results.
In an ideal world, there should never be any color space conversion on images with
alpha, since it's undefined what to do then, but in practice it's useful to have
this option.
Patch by Troy Sobotka, with changes by me.
