High Fidelity Backlog

Recap of May's Open Source Project Proposals for High Fidelity's Platform

Written by Emily Iwankovitsch | Jun 3, 2019 5:58:55 PM

The Open Source Project Proposals Meeting is a great place for any developer to discuss how they can contribute to High Fidelity's open source code base.

Here is a recap of submitted PRs and proposals that were discussed and merged.

 

Accepted and Merged Pull Requests (PRs)

Unify cube and sphere edit menu entries into one

Submitted by @SaracenOne

This unifies the cube and sphere in the Create tools, which we thought makes a ton of sense. PR was approved by @ZappoMan on the spot.

Render lightmaps in the forward renderer

Submitted by @SaracenOne

Work for experimental lightmap support being added to the forward renderer. This PR was recently approved and merged by @SamCake.

New PR Discussions

Material alpha-blending modes

Submitted by @SaracenOne

Our vision is to support the glTF spec as thoroughly as possible, and glTF importer improvements are on our radar as well. One of our interns recently put up a PR that supports skeletons and animations. We have an automated testing tool, "Nitpick," to use for any graphics engine changes, and this could help us with external developer PRs as well.

Empty weights FBX fix

Submitted by @SaracenOne

Unweighted vertices in an FBX should be parented to the root bone, not the root of the model. This PR will be merged once it passes code review, as the build is currently failing on Linux and Mac due to a used variable warning.

Add display name field to the log in screen

Submitted by @SaracenOne

This simply adds a new field which allows new users logging in to set their display name. Pre-merge testing is required, but Brad confirms it will be in Beta Release 84.

Other Topics

Forward rendering, including fog / haze

Shadow maps may be too heavy for low-end systems, which we are continuing to prioritize at this time.

Exposing a new API feature to the audio injectors that would allow streamed audio in High Fidelity on the client side

@PhilipRosedale cautioned about IP clearance of the actual code, as it is relevant to codec issues. Raw PCM data is what would be required, although advanced encoding would also be possible.

Need to be able to define permissions for events so one can invite others for collaborations

Essentially, giving a guest access conveyed through a prior access code.  @PhilipRosedale agrees that it's needed, and would be an open source project proposal we'd love to discuss more in depth at the next meeting.

PR Submission Guidance

Smaller submissions are better than big ones for a few reasons, but primarily because it’s more efficient for QA.

We encourage open source project proposals to be submitted prior to the monthly meeting so our team has time for consideration and preparation. Our leadership team will review the proposals thoroughly in the meeting, as time permits. It would be helpful for any developer to outline in their proposal what they’ve learned, and what they’re curious to know more about.

Thank you to everyone who attended and contributed to our last meeting. High Fidelity's next Open Source Project Proposals Meeting will be on June 12, 2019 from 9-10 a.m. PDT / 4-5 p.m. UTC. We look forward to reviewing and discussing the submitted proposals and PRs.