Zachary,
I too have been programming OpenGL for while (10 years) and I find learning
OSG to be quite humbling: very few of my OpenGL skills are immediatly
transferable. OSG is very much like what the MFC ins to Win32, however, with
MFC, there's always a way to use Win32 calls directly anywhere in the code.
OSG does not allow this, which is more elegant, but makes it harder to
"transition" from direct OpenGL.
I understand that the documentation is at it's infancy, so let's give it
time and try to contribute in making it better.
- Nick -
From: Zachary Hilbun <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Reply-To: osg-users@lists.openscenegraph.org
To: osg-users@lists.openscenegraph.org
Subject: Re: [osg-users] Tutorials
Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 16:13:29 -0700 (PDT)
The lack of documentation is very typical of Open
Source software. I've looked at other Open Source 3D
packages and they all have similar problems. Another
problem they all have is limited support for dotNet.
The creators of the different software I have looked
at are typically more interested in adding features
than they are in documentating the features they
already have. If you are trying to learn it, it's a
real problem because if a feature is not documented it
might as well not exist. If you are working in a
professional environment then the cost of a commercial
package and learning it could be less than the cost of
your time to learn a free but poorly documented
package.
With respect to OSG specifically I would say the Quick
Start guide is good as far as it goes. There is much
it does not cover however. The Reference Manual
doesn't cover everything either, and much of what it
does cover is simply a single sentence that is not
necessarly meaningful. There are several example apps
but they are not commented. I don't even know what
some of them are supposed to do after having looked at
them. Usually I can guess what is going on inside of
them, but because of the lack of comments sometimes I
don't really know why something is being done.
I've written a lot of OpenGL, read the OpenInventor
book, learned other 3D packages, and taken a graduate
course in Computer Graphics. I still find myself
having to guess at what a particular class or function
is supposed to do or how a particular function is
supposed to be called. I can imagine how difficult it
would be for a novice to learn OSG.
--- Nick Prudent <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> I'm a newbie too and I disagree. I'm also starting
> from ground-zero and I
> find it very useful and well-written.
>
> The Quick Start Guide assumes that you already know
> the following:
> * OpenGL
> * C++
> * STL
> Without this fundation, it's going to take longer.
>
> We all start from a different place, so writing for
> beginners is always
> tricky ;). Learning a new API is verry frustrating
> sometime but you have to
> stick with it.
>
> Nice job Paul!
>
> - Nick -
>
> >From: "Renan Mendes" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
> >Reply-To: osg-users@lists.openscenegraph.org
> >To: osg-users@lists.openscenegraph.org
> >Subject: Re: [osg-users] Tutorials
> >Date: Tue, 21 Aug 2007 09:28:39 -0300
> >
> >Yes, I have. And you can hardly say that's a
> tutorial for someone entirely
> >new to OSG. I'm right at the bottom, you know.
> Never dealed with Scene
> >Graphs in my whole life. Thanks for trying to help,
> anyway.
> >
> >Renan M Z Mendes
>
>
> >_______________________________________________
> >osg-users mailing list
> >osg-users@lists.openscenegraph.org
>
>http://lists.openscenegraph.org/listinfo.cgi/osg-users-openscenegraph.org
>
>
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>
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===============================
Zachary Hilbun
Software Contractor
Dallas, Tx
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