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• Making it GREAT! Oracle Partners Building Apps Workshop with UX and ADF in UK

  - by ultan o'broin

  Yes, making is what it's all about. This time, Oracle Partners in the UK were making great looking usable apps with the Oracle Applications Development Framework (ADF) and user experience (UX) toolkit. And what an energy-packed and productive event at the Oracle UK, Thames Valley Park, location it was. Partners learned the fundamentals of enterprise applications UX, why it's important, all about visual design, how to wireframe designs, and then how to build their already-proven designs in ADF. There was a whole day on mobile apps, learning about mobile design principles, free mobile UX and ADF resources from Oracle, and then trying it out. The workshop wrapped up with the latest Release 7 simplified UIs, Mobilytics, and other innovations from Oracle, and a live demo of a very neat ADF Mobile Android app built by an Oracle contractor. And, what a fun two days both Grant Ronald of ADF and myself had in running the workshop with such a great audience, too! I particularly enjoyed the wireframing and visual design sessions interaction; and seeing some outstanding work done by partners. Of note from the UK workshop were innovative design features not seen before and made me all the happier that developers were bringing their own ideas from the consumer IT world of mobility, simplicity, and social to the world of work apps in a smart way within an enterprise methodology too.  Partner wireframe exercise. Applying mobile design principles and UX design patterns means you've already productively making great usable apps! Next, over to Oracle ADF Mobile with it! One simple example from the design of a mobile field service app was that participants immediately saw how the UX and device functionality of the super UK-based app Hailo app could influence their designs (the London cabbie influence maybe?), as well as how we all use maps, cameras, barcode scanners and microphones on our phones could be used in work. And, of course, ADF Mobile has the device integration solutions there too! I wonder will U.S. workshops in Silicon Valley see an Uber UX influence (LOL)! That we also had partners experienced with Oracle Forms who could now offer a roadmap from Forms to Simplified UI and Mobile using ADF, and do it through through the cloud, really made this particular workshop go "ZING!" for me. Many thanks to the Oracle PartnerNetwork (OPN) team for organizing this event with us, and to the representatives of the Oracle Partners that showed and participated so well. That's what I love out this outreach. It's a two-way, solid value-add for all. Interested? Why would partners and developers with ADF skills sign up for this workshop? Here's why: Learn to use the Oracle Applications User Experience design patterns as the usability building blocks for applications development in Oracle Application Development Framework. The workshop enables attendees to build modern and visually compelling desktop and mobile applications that look and behave like Oracle Cloud Applications, and that can co-exist with partner integrations, new, or existing applications deployments. Partners learn to offer customers and clients more than just coded functionality; instead they can provide a complete user experience with a roadmap for continued ROI from applications that also creating more business and attracts the kudos and respect from other makers of apps as they're wowed by the results. So, if you're a partner and interested in attending one of these workshops and benefitting from such learning, as well as having a platform to show off some of your own work, stay well tuned to your OPN channels, to this blog, to the VoX blog, and to the @usableapps Twitter account too. Can't wait? For developers and partners, some key mobile resources to explore now Oracle ADF Mobile UX Patterns and Components Wiki Oracle ADF Academy (Mobile) Oracle ADF Insider Essentials Oracle Applications Mobile User Experience Design Patterns and Guidance

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• Something other than Vertex Welding with Texture Atlas?

  - by Tim Winter

  What options (in C# with XNA) would there be for texture usage in a procedural generated 3D world made of cubes to increase performance? Yes, it's like Minecraft. I've been doing a texture atlas and rendering faces individually (4 vertices per face), but I've also read in a couple places about using texture wrapping with two 1D atlases to merge adjacent faces with the same texture. If two or more adjacent faces share the same image, it'd be quite easy to wrap in this way reducing vertices by a large amount. My problem with this is having too many textures, swapping too often, and many image related things like non-power of 2 images. Is there a middle ground option between the 1D texture atlas trick and rendering 4 vertices per cube face? This is a picture of what I have currently (in wireframe). 4 vertices per face seems extremely inefficient to me.

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• drawing thick, textured lines in OpenGL

  - by NateS

  I need to draw thick textured line segments in OpenGL. Actually I need curves made out of short line segments. Here is what I have: In the upper left is an example of two connected line segments. The second image shows once the lines are given width, they overlap. If I apply a texture that uses translucency, the overlap looks terrible. The third image shows that both lines are shortened by half the amount necessary to make the thick line corners just touch. This way I can fill the space between the lines with a triangle. On the right you can see this works well (ignore the horizontal line when the crappy texture repeats). But it doesn't always work well. In the bottom left the curve is made of many short line segments. Note the incorrect texture application. My program is written in Java, making use of the LWJGL OpenGL binding (and minor use of Slick, a 2D helper framework). I've made a zip file that contains an executable JAR so you can easily see the problem. It also has the Java code (there is only one source file) and an Eclipse project, so you can instantly run it through Eclipse and hack at it if you like. Here she is: http://n4te.com/temp/lines.zip To run, execute "java -jar lines.jar". You may need "-Djava.library.path=." before -jar if you are not on Windows. Press space to toggle texture/wireframe. The wireframe only shows the line segments, the triangle between them isn't drawn. I don't need to draw arbitrary lines, just bezier curves similar to what you see in the program. Sorry the code is a bit messy, once I have a solution I will refactor. I have investigated using GLUtessellator. It greatly simplified construction of the line, but I found that applying the texture was perfect. It worked most of the time (top image below), but long vertical curves would have severe texture distortion (bottom image below): This turned out to be much easier to code, but in the end worse than my approach. I believe what I'm trying to do is called "line tessellation" or "stroke tessellation". I assume this has been solved already? Is there standard code I can leverage? Otherwise, how can I fix my code so that the texture does not freak out on short, vertical curves?

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• Building Great-Looking, Usable Apps: A two-day workshop applying Oracle’s best UX practices in ADF

  - by mvaughan

  By Misha Vaughan, Oracle Applications User ExperienceI have been with Oracle for more than 12 years. It is a company that has granted me extraordinary creative freedom to help deliver compelling experiences for customers.I am beyond proud to talk about one of the experiences we just took for a test drive. Recently, we delivered a first-of-its-kind, three-team collaboration, train-the-trainer event in Reading, U.K., on building great-looking, usable apps based on Oracle Fusion Applications -- using the ADF tool kit. A new kind of workshopKevin Li, Platform Product Director, asked the Oracle Applications User Experience VP, Jeremy Ashley, if the team had anything to help partners and customers build applications that looked like Fusion. He was receiving this request from European partners and customers.Some quick conversations ensued, and the idea for the workshop was born: We would conduct an experiment.  We would work with feedback from the key Platform Technology Solutions (PTS) trainers under Andre Pavanello, Director, Platform Technology Solutions, in Europe, Middle East, and Africa. We would partner with the ADF team lead by Grant Ronald, Director of Product Management, title> and leverage the Applications UX expertise in Ashley’s team.The goal: Create a pilot workshop that in two days would explain to an ADF developer how to leverage the next-generation user experience best-practices developed for Fusion Apps. Why? Customers who need integrations with Oracle Fusion Applications, who are looking for custom applications that need to co-exist with Fusion, or who quite simply want a next-generation design for a custom app, need their solutions to reflect the next-generation research and design.Building an event for an ADF developerThe biggest hurdle was figuring out where to start.  How far into user experience country do you take an ADF developer? How far into ADF do you need to go if you are a UX professional?After some time in the UX kitchen, the workshop recipe looked like this: Mix equal parts: Fusion user experience design principles and functional design patterns The art and science behind UX How to wireframe designs that you can build in Fusion How to translate those designs into an ADF application Ultan O’Broin, Director of Global User Experience, explaining the trouble ticket wireframe design exerciseLynn Munsinger, Senior Group Product Manager, explaining the follow-on trouble ticket ADF coding exercise For spice, add:•    Debra Lilley, Fujitsu and ACE director, showcasing some of the latest ADF design work in the new face of Fusion Applications •    Partner show-and-tell of example apps they have built with FMW and ADF that are dynamic, beautiful, and interactive.Debra Lilley, Oracle ACE Director and Fujitsu Fusion Champion on the new face of Fusion built with ADF and Fusion extensibility with composers as a window into “the possible”?The taste testThis first go-round of the workshop was aimed squarely at ADF developers and partners.  We were privileged to have participation and feedback from:•    Sten Vesterli, Scott/Tiger S. A., Denmark•    John Sim, Fishbowl Solutions, UK•    Josef Huber, Primus Delphi Group, Munich•    Thaddaus Weindl, Primus Delphi, Group , Munich•    Praveen Pillalamarri, EiS Technologies, Bangalore•    Balaji Kamepalli, EiS Technologies, Bangalore•    Plinio Arbizu, Services & Processes Solutions S. A., Mexico•    Yannick Ongena, infoMENTUM, UK•    Jakub Ciszek, infoMENTUM, UK•    Mauro Flores, infoMENTUM, UK•    Matteo Formica, infoMENTUM, UKRichard Bingham, Oracle, Mauro Flores and Matteo Formica, infoMENTUMWhy is this so exciting?  Oracle has invested heavily in the research and development of the Oracle Fusion Applications user experience. This investment has been and continues to be applied across the product lines. Now, we finally get to teach customers and partners how to take advantage of this investment for custom solutions.This event was a pilot to test-drive the content, as well as a train-the-trainer event that our EMEA colleagues will be using with partners who want to build with Fusion Apps design patterns.What did attendees think?"I liked most the science stuff, like eye-tracking, design patterns and best-practice (color, contrast),” Josef Huber said. “It was a very good introduction to UI design, and most developers and project managers are very bad in that.  So this course would be good for all developers and even project managers." Team Anonymous: John Sim, Fishbowl Solutions, Flavius Sana, Oracle, Josef Huber, infoMENTUM, Mireille Duroussaud, Oracle. Winners of the wireframing design exercise.  Sten Vesterli, of Scott/Tiger, said he attended to learn techniques he could use in his own projects. He wants to ensure that his applications better meet the needs of his users, and he said sessions during the workshop on user interface design and wireframing were most useful to him.  “Go to this event to learn the art and science of good user interfaces from people who really know how to do it,” he said.Sten Vesterli, Scott/Tiger, Angelo Santagata, Oracle Plinio Arbizu said the workshop fulfilled his goals, thanks to the recommendations given in how to design user interfaces to facilitate the adoption of applications among the final users. “The workshop combined these recommendations with an exercise that improved the technical comprehension, permitting the usage of JDeveloper to set forth our solutions,” he said. He added: “The first session that I really enjoyed was the five Fusion design principles. It was incredible to discover how these simple principles were included in an inherit manner in Fusion Applications, and I had been using many of them applying only ADF components.  Another topic that I enjoyed a lot was the eight recommendations about the visual design of UIs. The issues that were raised in that lesson are unknown to the developers and of great value to achieve an attractive presentation layer to the end users.  Participate in this workshop, and include these usability features in your projects and in this manner not only to facilitate and improve the user productivity, but also to distinguish you as a professional who takes advantage fully of the functionalities offered by Oracle technology. Praveen Pillalamarri came to the workshop to learn about the difficulties faced in UI and UX development, and how this can be resolved with the help of ADF.  He also appreciated the opportunity to talk with other individuals who came to the workshop. Pillalmarri said, “The way we looked at things in terms of work and projects were sharpened.  UI and UX design knowledge shared by you was quite interesting, especially the minute things which we ignored in the UI or UX design.” Plinio Arbizu, Services & Processes Solutions S. A., Richard Bingham, Oracle, Balaji Kamepalli, & Praveen Pillalamarri, EiS TechnologiesReady to spread the wordIn EMEA, Oracle customers and partners have access to three world-class trainers via Platform Technology Solutions: Mireille Duroussaud, Flavius Sana, and Angelo Santagata. Contact Andre Pavanello if you like to experience this workshop firsthand, or you have customers or partners who would benefit from the training.We are looking to bring the event to the U.S. in spring 2013. If you have interest in this kind of a workshop, leave a comment below. For those who want to follow the action, join the ADF Enterprise Methodology Group run by Oracle’s Chris Muir. Ask questions and continue with the conversation in this forum, or check blogs.oracle.com/usableapps for topics emerging from the workshop.

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• Drawing a rectangular prism using opengl

  - by BadSniper

  I'm trying to learn opengl. I did some code for building a rectangular prism. I don't want to draw back faces so I used glCullFace(GL_BACK), glEnable(GL_CULL_FACE);. But I keep getting back faces also when viewing from front and also sometimes when rotating sides are vanishing. Can someone point me in right direction? glPolygonMode(GL_FRONT,GL_LINE); // draw wireframe polygons glColor3f(0,1,0); // set color green glCullFace(GL_BACK); // don't draw back faces glEnable(GL_CULL_FACE); // don't draw back faces glTranslatef(-10, 1, 0); // position glBegin(GL_QUADS); // face 1 glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); // face 2 glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,5,0); glVertex3f(2,5,2); // face 3 glVertex3f(0,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,2); glVertex3f(2,5,2); glVertex3f(2,5,0); // face 4 glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,5,2); glVertex3f(0,5,2); // face 5 glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(0,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,2); // face 6 glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,0); glEnd();

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• Day of Windows Phone 7 at Orlando Code Camp 2010

  - by Nikita Polyakov

  Orlando is coming up fast behind Tampa and South Florida Code Camps. This year, even more so. Check out the schedule and register: http://www.orlandocodecamp.com/  What: All day geek fest focusing on code and not marketing fluff. When: Saturday, March, 27, 2010 All day (registration opens at 7:00am) Where: Seminole State College - Sanford\Lake Mary Campus - 100 Weldon Boulevard Sanford, FL 32773 Cost: Free! A good fellow community leader Will Strohl has a great blog post on What to Expect from Orlando Code Camp 2010 Also, believe it or now there will be a first ever MSDN Webcast: Simulcast Event: Orlando Code Camp where you can watch a select few sessions from home, if you become ill or have another reasonable excuse or just un-realistically far away. Needless to say this is not even close to being there and watching the rest of the sessions, as you don’t get to choose what is shown. But, let’s get back to the topic - there is a full day of Windows Phone 7 Developer topics. I am speaking at 2 sessions: 8:30 AM Prototyping with SketchFlow SketchFlow is a new feature in Expression Blend 3 that enables rapid prototyping of web sites and applications. SketchFlow helps designers, developers, information architects and account managers sketch, wireframe and prototype user experiences and user interfaces. [yes, I will show a some WP7 related SketchFlow towards the end] 9:45 AM Intro to Windows Phone 7 This session will be discussing and showing the new WP7 OS and how new methods of navigation work. This is relevant to understand before you start building your first app. One of the sessions later in the day will be a Install Fest and one will be a code-along, so bring your laptop, if you want. You will find Kevin Wolf, Bill Reiss and I to ask questions at the panel at the end of the day. I will be hanging out all day at the Mobile track and as always during lunch and after dinner. Final topic descriptions and order of presentations is being finalized.

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• Depth interpolation for z-buffer, with scanline

  - by Twodordan

  I have to write my own software 3d rasterizer, and so far I am able to project my 3d model made of triangles into 2d space: I rotate, translate and project my points to get a 2d space representation of each triangle. Then, I take the 3 triangle points and I implement the scanline algorithm (using linear interpolation) to find all points[x][y] along the edges(left and right) of the triangles, so that I can scan the triangle horizontally, row by row, and fill it with pixels. This works. Except I have to also implement z-buffering. This means that knowing the rotated&translated z coordinates of the 3 vertices of the triangle, I must interpolate the z coordinate for all other points I find with my scanline algorithm. The concept seems clear enough, I first find Za and Zb with these calculations: var Z_Slope = (bottom_point_z - top_point_z) / (bottom_point_y - top_point_y); var Za = top_point_z + ((current_point_y - top_point_y) * Z_Slope); Then for each Zp I do the same interpolation horizontally: var Z_Slope = (right_z - left_z) / (right_x - left_x); var Zp = left_z + ((current_point_x - left_x) * Z_Slope); And of course I add to the zBuffer, if current z is closer to the viewer than the previous value at that index. (my coordinate system is x: left - right; y: top - bottom; z: your face - computer screen;) The problem is, it goes haywire. The project is here and if you select the "Z-Buffered" radio button, you'll see the results... (note that the rest of the options before "Z-Buffered" use the Painter's algorithm to correctly order the triangles. I also use the painter's algorithm -only- to draw the wireframe in "Z-Buffered" mode for debugging purposes) PS: I've read here that you must turn the z's into their reciprocals (meaning z = 1/z) before you interpolate. I tried that, and it appears that there's no change. What am I missing? (could anyone clarify, precisely where you must turn z into 1/z and where to turn it back?)

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• 3DS Max 2012 OBJ file import missing polygons

  - by Vit

  I started learning OpenGL. I got to a point I want to import some "real" objects. After "Googling" I decided I will go with OBJ file for start, since it is simple to understand, and there are plenty of tutorials on how to read them properly. I have from university access to 3DS Max 2012. So I tried to create very simple model (just deformated cube) and exporting it using OBJ file, just to vertices and triangles for the moment, without textures, so I can examine its structure by myself. But if I imported it right back to 3DS from OBJ file, now it renders somewhat strange, like its smoothen, and with lightsource, even I have none in scene. But the geometry, its wireframe is intact. So I thought maybe it is problem of exporting only vertices and triangles so I downloaded Enterprise-D model from internet, exported with everything on (normals, textures everything), and again imported it. Now, some polygons are missing. So, I want to ask, am I doing something terribly wrong, or is there some incompatibility issue between .max and .obj file ? Even it is only simple textured model without any lightsources, animation etc.? Thanks. Edit: I tried objects with MeshLab, the first, deformated cube was absolutelly OK. But still bothers me that 3DS Max doesen´t render it properly. In Enterprise-D model, there are polygons missing even in MeshLab. I uploaded rar archive with .max model of Enterprise, same .obj model exported from 3DS, and obj model of deformated cube. Download here (2.5 MB, filesonic).

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• Why isn't my lighting working properly? Are my normals messed up?

  - by Radek Slupik

  I'm relatively new to OpenGL and I am trying to draw a 3D model (loaded from a 3ds file using lib3ds) using OpenGL with lighting, but about half of it is drawn in black. I set up the light as such: glEnable(GL_LIGHTING); glShadeModel(GL_SMOOTH); GLfloat ambientColor[] = {0.2f, 0.2f, 0.2f, 1.0f}; glLightModelfv(GL_LIGHT_MODEL_AMBIENT, ambientColor); glEnable(GL_LIGHT0); GLfloat lightColor0[] = {1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f, 1.0f}; GLfloat lightPos0[] = {4.0f, 0.0f, 8.0f, 0.0f}; glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_DIFFUSE, lightColor0); glLightfv(GL_LIGHT0, GL_POSITION, lightPos0); The model is in a VBO and drawn using glDrawArrays. The normals are in a separate VBO, and the normals are calculated using lib3ds_mesh_calculate_vertex_normals: std::vector<std::array<float, 3>> normals; for (std::size_t i = 0; i < model->nmeshes; ++i) { auto& mesh = *model->meshes[i]; std::vector<float[3]> vertex_normals(mesh.nfaces * 3); lib3ds_mesh_calculate_vertex_normals(&mesh, vertex_normals.data()); for (std::size_t j = 0; j < mesh.nfaces; ++j) { auto& face = mesh.faces[j]; normals.push_back(make_array(vertex_normals[j])); } } glBindBuffer(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER, normal_vbo_); glBufferData(GL_ARRAY_BUFFER, normals.size() * sizeof(decltype(normals)::value_type), normals.data(), GL_STATIC_DRAW); The problem isn't the vertices; the model is drawn correctly when drawing it as a wireframe. I also fixed the normals in Blender using controlN. What could be the problem? Should I store the normals in a different order?

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• Updating an interface to bootstrap

  - by Anagio

  I'm updating a web apps interface to bootstrap. There's a lot of existing CSS and Javascript/jQuery i'll have to migrate, most i'll scrap and use bootstraps. But for parts of the app that use datatables and such all that code has to be migrated. I'm working on a development server. The app has a header.phtml sidebar.phtml and a lot of content area view files. Right now i'm building static versions of view files say the header. I then open my existing header.phtml into notepad++ split screen with the static file and copy over the dynamic code. Then replace the old header.phtml with the one I just made. To make sure the header displayed correctly I had to add all the CSS and JS from bootstrap. This is conflicting with the current CSS styles and some JS conflicts as well. Should I go through the app note what JS I absolutely need what I don't and same with the CSS. Then strip all the CSS/JS from the old app that is not needed so it only has bootstraps and any other critical files and not worry about the way pages look as i'm making progress to updating them. I'd be working on mostly a wireframe of the old site without any styles until I get to applying bootstraps. Is this efficient or is there another way I can get through all these files and update them easily?

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• Lighting with VBO

  - by nkint

  I'm using a Java JOGL wrapper called processing.org. I have coded some enviroment on it and I'm quite proud of it even if it has some ready stuffs that I didn't know anything about it (==LIGHTS). Then, for some geometry, I've decided to use a VBO. I had to pass in the hard way and recode all lights. But I can't achieve the same result. This is the original light system: And this with VBO: With this code: Vec3D l; gl.glEnable(GL.GL_LIGHTING); gl.glEnable(GL.GL_LIGHT0); gl.glEnable(GL.GL_COLOR_MATERIAL); gl.glMaterialfv(GL.GL_FRONT_AND_BACK, GL.GL_AMBIENT, new float[]{0.8f,0f,0f}, 0); l = new Vec3D(0,0,-10); gl.glColor3f(0.8f,0f,0f); gl.glLightfv(GL.GL_LIGHT0, GL.GL_POSITION, new float[] { l.x, l.y, l.z, 0 }, 0); gl.glLightfv(GL.GL_LIGHT0, GL.GL_SPOT_DIRECTION, new float[] { 1, 1, 1, 1 }, 0); I can't achive the same light, the same color material, and the same wireframe stuffs. If needed I can also post the code I use for VBO, but it is quite standard vertex array grabbed on the net that uses glDrawArrays

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• Wrong faces culled in OpenGL when drawing a rectangular prism

  - by BadSniper

  I'm trying to learn opengl. I did some code for building a rectangular prism. I don't want to draw back faces so I used glCullFace(GL_BACK), glEnable(GL_CULL_FACE);. But I keep getting back faces also when viewing from front and also sometimes when rotating sides are vanishing. Can someone point me in right direction? glPolygonMode(GL_FRONT,GL_LINE); // draw wireframe polygons glColor3f(0,1,0); // set color green glCullFace(GL_BACK); // don't draw back faces glEnable(GL_CULL_FACE); // don't draw back faces glTranslatef(-10, 1, 0); // position glBegin(GL_QUADS); // face 1 glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); // face 2 glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,5,0); glVertex3f(2,5,2); // face 3 glVertex3f(0,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,2); glVertex3f(2,5,2); glVertex3f(2,5,0); // face 4 glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,-1,2); glVertex3f(2,5,2); glVertex3f(0,5,2); // face 5 glVertex3f(0,-1,2); glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(0,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,2); // face 6 glVertex3f(0,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,-1,0); glVertex3f(2,5,0); glVertex3f(0,5,0); glEnd();

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• XNA - Obtaining depth from the scene's render target?

  - by user1423893

  I'm currently rendering my scene to a render target so it can be used for rendering methods such as post processing and order independent transparency. rtScene = new RenderTarget2D( GraphicsDevice, GraphicsDevice.PresentationParameters.BackBufferWidth, GraphicsDevice.PresentationParameters.BackBufferHeight, false, SurfaceFormat.Rgba64, DepthFormat.Depth24Stencil8, // Requires a depth format for objects to be drawn correctly (e.g. wireframe model surrounding model) 0, RenderTargetUsage.PreserveContents ); I am required to use RenderTargetUsage.PreserveContents so that the same render target can be rendered to multiple times, once for each of the draw methods below. DrawBackground DrawDeferred DrawForward DrawTransparent The problem is that DrawTransparent requires a copy of the scene's depth as a texture. Is there any way to obtain this from the scene render target above (rtScene)? I can't have more than one render target with RenderTargetUsage.PreserveContents as this causes problems on hardware such as the XBOX 360, so rendering the depth to a separate render target at the same time as I render the scene isn't possible as far as I can tell. Would I be able to get around this problem by "Ping-Ponging" two render targets (using the more compatible RenderTargetUsage.DiscardContents) and using the result for the depth texture?

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• How do I prevent jagged edges alongside the surfaces of my 3d model?

  - by badcodenotreat

  Lets say I've implemented in openGL a crude model viewer with shading which renders a series of blocks, such that I have something that looks like this. http://i.imgur.com/TsF7K.jpg Whenever I rotate my model to the side, it causes an unwanted jagged effect along any surface with a steep viewing angle. http://i.imgur.com/Bgl9o.jpg I'm pretty sure this is due to the polygon offset I used to prevent z-fighting between the model and the wireframe, however I'm not able to find the factor/unit parameters in openGL which prevent this unwanted effect. what are the best values of factor and unit for glPolygonOffset to prevent this? would implementing anti-aliasing alleviate the problem? is the trade off in performance trivial/significant? is this perhaps a shading issue? should i try a solution along this line of thought?

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• Targeting specific material by name in the imported model

  - by Aleksander Lenart

  I'm trying to select a particular material in the imported model (via Collada loader) in Three.js. I know this can be done with the getChildByName method but it just doesn't work for me. I couldn't find any working example with this method included, either. What am I doing wrong here? loader = new THREE.ColladaLoader(); loader.load('myModel.dae', function ( collada ) { model = collada.scene; var myMaterial = model.getChildByName( 'materialName', true ); myMaterial.material = new THREE.MeshBasicMaterial( { wireframe: true } ); });

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• What tools do you use when generating markup from mockups?

  - by Paul

  So I endeavor to spend most of time on the app server side of things but time to time I need to get my hands dirty and generate markup/css/js from a wireframe or mockup. As far as tools go, Ive found browsershots and Litmus app helpful and of course, vm's as well for checking things out live in ie-{6,7,8}. Otherwise I do the heavy lifting in vim. For generating new markup thats not tied to a target design I think some of the css frameworks & tools like sass look useful but Im skeptical of their utility when needing to generate markup to match a photoshop design. So what tips / tools do you keep in your markup generating utility belt when building solid markup from designs? My list so far: Browsershots Browserlab.adobe.com Haml / Less / Sass (not used but will probably explore)

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• Managing software projects - advice needed

  - by Callum

  I work for a large government department as part of an IT team that manages and develops websites as well as stand alone web applications. We’re running in to problems somewhere in the SDLC that don’t rear their ugly head until time and budget are starting to run out. We try to be “Agile” (software specifications are not as thorough as possible, clients have direct access to the developers any time they want) and we are also in a reasonably peculiar position in that we are not allowed to make profit from the services we provide. We only service the divisions within our government department, and can only charge for the time and effort we actually put in to a project. So if we deliver a project that we have over-quoted on, we will only invoice for the actual time spent. Our software specifications are not as thorough as they could be, but they always include at a minimum: Wireframe mockups for every form view A data dictionary of all field inputs Descriptions of any business rules that affect the system Descriptions of the outputs I’m new to software management, but I’ve overseen enough software projects now to know that as soon as users start observing demos of the system, they start making a huge amount of requests like “Can we add a few more fields to this report.. can we redesign the look of this interface.. can we send an email at this part of the workflow.. can we take this button off this view.. can we make this function redirect to a different screen.. can we change some text on this screen… can we create a special account where someone can log in and get access to X… this report takes too long to run can it be optimised.. can we remove this step in the workflow… there’s got to be a better image we can put here…” etc etc etc. Some changes are tiny and can be implemented reasonably quickly.. but there could be up to 50-100 or so of such requests during the course of the SDLC. Other change requests are what clients claim they “just assumed would be part of the system” even if not explicitly spelled out in the spec. We are having a lot of difficulty managing this process. With no experienced software project managers in our team, we need to come up with a better way to both internally identify whether work being requested is “out of spec”, and be able to communicate this to a client in such a manner that they can understand why what they are asking for is “extra” work. We need a way to track this work and be transparent with it. In the spirit of Agile development where we are not spec'ing software systems in to the ground and back again before development begins, and bearing in mind that clients have access to any developer any time they want it, I am looking for some tips and pointers from experienced software project managers on how to handle this sort of "scope creep" problem, in tracking it, being transparent with it, and communicating it to clients such that they understand it. Happy to clarify anything as needed. I really appreciate anyone who takes the time to offer some advice. Thanks.

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• how do I add a texture to a triangle in three.js?

  - by Kae Verens

  I've created a scene which has many cubes, spheres, etc, in it, and have been able to apply textures to those primitives, but when I want to add a texture to a simple triangle, I'm totally lost. Here's the closest I've come to getting it right: var texture=THREE.ImageUtils.loadTexture('/f/3d-images/texture-steel.jpg'); var materialDecalRoof=new THREE.MeshBasicMaterial( { 'map': texture, 'wireframe': false, 'overdraw': true } ); var geometry = new THREE.Geometry(); geometry.vertices.push(new THREE.Vector3(tentX/2+1, tentY, tentZ/2+1)); geometry.vertices.push(new THREE.Vector3(0, tentT, 0)); geometry.vertices.push(new THREE.Vector3(0, tentT, 0)); geometry.vertices.push(new THREE.Vector3(-tentX/2-1, tentY, tentZ/2+1)); geometry.faces.push(new THREE.Face4(0, 1, 2, 3)); geometry.faceVertexUvs[0].push([ new THREE.UV(0, 0), new THREE.UV(0, 0), new THREE.UV(0, 0), new THREE.UV(0, 0) ]); geometry.computeFaceNormals(); geometry.computeCentroids(); geometry.computeVertexNormals(); var mesh= new THREE.Mesh( geometry, materialDecalRoof); scene.add(mesh); This does not work. All i get is a flickering triangle (when the scene is moved) where an image should be. To test this, go to https://www.poptents.eu/3dFrame.php, upload an image in the Roof section, and drag the view to see the roof flicker. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong here?

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• Draw Rectangle with XNA

  - by mazzzzz

  Hey guys, I was working on game, and wanted to highlight a spot on the screen when something happens, I created a class to do this for me, and found a bit of code to draw the rectangle static private Texture2D CreateRectangle(int width, int height, Color colori) { Texture2D rectangleTexture = new Texture2D(game.GraphicsDevice, width, height, 1, TextureUsage.None, SurfaceFormat.Color);// create the rectangle texture, ,but it will have no color! lets fix that Color[] color = new Color[width * height];//set the color to the amount of pixels in the textures for (int i = 0; i < color.Length; i++)//loop through all the colors setting them to whatever values we want { color[i] = colori; } rectangleTexture.SetData(color);//set the color data on the texture return rectangleTexture;//return the texture } Problem is that the code above is called every update, (60 times a second), and it was not written with optimization in mind, I have no clue how else to write a code to do this though. It needs to be extremely fast (the code above freezes the game, which has only skeleton code right now).. Any suggestions. Note: Any new code would be great (WireFrame/Fill are both fine). I would like to be able to specify color. Something to point in the right direction would be great, Thanks, Max

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• generating images with php based on css3 gradient settings?

  - by thrice801

  Hi, Does anyone know if there is a php library, or if there isnt, have any input on how one would go about generating an image via php, from basic HTML element input settings, and CSS 3 gradient parameters. To give an example on why this would be useful, I have found as of a couple days ago, that laying out the wireframe for a webpage using basic Css3 gradient styling speeds up my design and development time by, well, alot. I cant design from photoshop, Ill spend hours tweaking stupid little things that only lead to me tweaking more stupid little things to compensate for stupid little changes. -- So, I had an epiphany to stop using photoshop until the end, and just focus on the main styling of elements, text-shadow, and borders for highlights, and I feel I am able to make super clean, more focused layout by being more restricted to the basics of graphic design with just css. Anyways, so Im planning on after I have the layouts done, to then recreate the graphics in photoshop, so that every browser is able to render the images. This wont take long, but as far as repeating it goes, if I could just do it with PHP, that would be incredible. For instance, take this style for example, which renders a clean looking ipad/pod ish menu/button gradient. [code] background: -moz-linear-gradient(top, #808080, #454545 50%, #313131 51%, #333333); background: -webkit-gradient(linear, left top, left bottom, color-stop(0, #808080), color-stop(.5, #454545), color-stop(.5, #313131), to(#333333));[/code] Basically what Im looking to do is take one or more inputs that control rendering the image as you see there. Take a width and a height input, and then render the image gradient accordingly, so I can save it, upload it and then use it in my designs. So ya, I know PHP has some image generation capabilities but I dont know to what extent, any input on the most effective way to go about doing this or whether it already exists, would be appreciated!

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• A Quick Primer on SharePoint Customization

  - by PeterBrunone

  Normal 0 false false false EN-US X-NONE X-NONE MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman","serif";} This one goes out to all the people who have been asked to change the way a SharePoint site looks.  Management wants to know how long it will take, and you can whip that out by tomorrow, right?  If you don't have time to prepare a treatise on what's involved, or if you just want to lend some extra weight to your case by quoting a blogger who was an MVP for seven years, then dive right in; this post is for you. There are three main components of SharePoint visual customization:   1)       Theme – A theme encompasses all the standardized text formatting and coloring (borders, fonts, etc), including the background images of various sections. All told, there could be around 50 images involved, and a few hundred CSS (style) classes.  Installing a theme once it’s been created is no great feat.  Given the number of pieces, of course, creating a new theme could take anywhere from a day to a week… once decisions have been made about the desired appearance. 2)      Master Page – A master page provides the framework for page layout.  This includes all the top and side menus, where content shows up, et cetera.  Master pages have been around for a long time in ASP.NET (Microsoft’s web development platform), and they do require some .NET programming knowledge.  Beyond that, in SharePoint, there are a few dozen controls which the system expects find on a given page.  They’re not all used at once, but if they’re not there when they’re needed, chaos ensues.  Estimating a custom master page is difficult, as it depends on the level of customization.  I’ve been on projects where I was brought in simply to fix some problems and add a few finishing touches, and it took 2-3 weeks.  Master page customization requires a large amount of testing time to make sure that the HTML, JavaScript, CSS, and control placement all work well together. 3)      Individual page layout – Each page (ideally) uses a master page for its template, but within the content areas defined by the master page, web parts can be added, removed, and configured from within the browser.  The wireframe that Brent provided could most likely be completed simply by manipulating the content on the home page in this fashion, and we had allowed about a day of effort for the task.  If needed, further functionality can be provided by an experienced ASP.NET developer; custom forms are a common example.  This of course is a bit more in-depth than simple content manipulation and could take several days per page (or more; there’s really no way to quantify this without a set of requirements).   That’s basically it.  To recap:  Fonts and coloring are done with themes, and can take anywhere from a day to a week to create (not counting creative time); required technical skills include HTML, CSS, and image manipulation.  Templated layout is done with master pages, and generally requires a developer familiar with both ASP.NET and SharePoint in particular; it can have far-reaching consequences depending on the complexity of the changes, and could add weeks or months to a project.  Page layout can be as simple as content manipulation in the web browser, taking a few hours per page, or it can involve more detail, like custom forms, and can require programming expertise and significantly more development time.

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• Deep in the Heart of Texas

  - by Applications User Experience

  Author: Erika Webb, Manager, Fusion Applications UX User Assistance When I was first working in the usability field, the only way I could consider conducting a usability study was to bring a potential user to a lab environment where I could show them whatever I was interested in learning more about and ask them questions. While I hate to reveal just how long I have been working in this field, let's just say that pads of paper and a stopwatch were key tools for any test I conducted. Over the years, I have worked in simple labs with basic video taping equipment and not much else, and I have worked in corporate environments with sophisticated usability labs and state-of-the-art equipment. Years ago, we conducted all usability studies at the location of the user. If we wanted to see if there were any differences between users in New York, Chicago, and Los Angeles, we went to those places to run the test. A lab environment is very useful for many test situations. However, there has always been a debate in the usability field about whether bringing someone into a lab environment, however friendly we make it, somehow intrinsically changes the behavior of the user as compared to having them work in their own environment, at their own desk, and on their own computer. We developed systems to create a portable usability lab, so that we could go to the users that we needed to test.  Do lab environments change user behavior patterns? Then 9/11 hit. You may not remember, but no planes flew for weeks afterwards. Companies all over the world couldn't fly-in employees for meetings. Suddenly, traveling to the location of the users had an additional difficulty. The company I was working for at the time had usability specialists stuck in New York for days before they could finally rent a car and drive home to Colorado. This changed the world pretty suddenly, and technology jumped on the change. Companies offering Internet meeting tools were strugglinguntil no one could travel. The Internet boomed with collaboration tools that enabled people to work together wherever they happened to be. This change in technology has made a huge difference in my world. We use collaborative tools to bring our product concepts and ideas to the user across the Internet. As a global company, we benefit from having users from all over the world inform our designs. We now run usability studies with users all over the world in a single day, a feat we couldn't have accomplished 10 years ago by plane! Other technology companies have started to do more of this type of usability testing, since the tools have improved so dramatically. Plus, in our busy world, it's not always easy to find users who can take the time away from their jobs to come to our labs. reaching users where it is convenient for them greatly improves the odds that people do participate. I manage a team of usability specialists who live in India and California, whlie I live in Colorado. We have wonderful labs that we bring users into to show them our products. But very often, we run our studies remotely. We used to take the lab to the users now we use the labs, but we let the users stay where they are. We gain users who might not have been able to leave work to come to our labs, and they get to use the system they are familiar with. And we gain users nearly anywhere that we can set up an Internet connection, as long as the users have a phone, a broadband connection, and a compatible Web browser (with no pop-up blockers). After we recruit participants in a traditional manner, we send them an invitation to participate through the use of a telephone conference call and Web conferencing tool. At Oracle, we use Oracle Web Conference part of Oracle Collaboration Suite, which enables us to give the user control of the mouse, while we present a prototype or wireframe pictures. We can record the sessions over the Web and phone conference. We send the users instructions, plus tips to ensure that we won't have problems sharing screens. In some cases, when time is tight, we even run a five-minute "test session" with users a day in advance to be sure that we can connect. Prior to the test, we send users a participant script that contains information about the study, including any questionnaires. This is exactly the same script we give to participants who come to the labs. We ask users to print this before the beginning of the session. We generally run these studies by having a usability engineer in our usability labs, so that we can record the session as though the user were in the lab with us. Roughly 80% of our application software usability testing at Oracle is performed using remote methods. The probability of getting a   remote test participant decreases the higher up the person is in the target organization. We have a methodology checklist available to help our usability engineers work through the remote processes.

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• Why can't I render objects to texture properly using FBO?

  - by Brett

  Hello, I'm trying to implement a simple program using 3 FBO's to render a scene to a texture and display a textured quad. I've successfully done this previously using fragment shaders before projecting to the textured quad but can't get it to work without a shader. What could be wrong? First I set up my textures glGenTextures(3, renderTextureID); for (GLint i = 0; i < 3; i++) { glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, renderTextureID[i]); glTexParameterf(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_S, GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE); glTexParameterf(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_WRAP_T, GL_CLAMP_TO_EDGE); glTexParameterf(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MIN_FILTER, GL_LINEAR); glTexParameterf(GL_TEXTURE_2D, GL_TEXTURE_MAG_FILTER, GL_LINEAR); // this may change with window size changes glTexImage2D(GL_TEXTURE_2D, 0, GL_RGBA8, fboWidth, fboHeight, 0, GL_RGBA, GL_UNSIGNED_BYTE, 0); } Next some framebuffer state glGenFramebuffersEXT(3, framebufferID); glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, framebufferID[0]); glFramebufferTexture2DEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, GL_COLOR_ATTACHMENT0_EXT, GL_TEXTURE_2D, renderTextureID[0], 0); GLenum fboStatus = glCheckFramebufferStatusEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT); if(fboStatus != GL_FRAMEBUFFER_COMPLETE_EXT) { fprintf(stderr, "FBO Error!"); } glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, framebufferID[1]); glFramebufferTexture2DEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, GL_COLOR_ATTACHMENT0_EXT, GL_TEXTURE_2D, renderTextureID[1], 0); glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, framebufferID[2]); glFramebufferTexture2DEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, GL_COLOR_ATTACHMENT0_EXT, GL_TEXTURE_2D, renderTextureID[2], 0); glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, 0); Then I render the scene glViewport(0, 0, fboWidth, fboHeight); glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, framebufferID[0]); glClear(GL_COLOR_BUFFER_BIT | GL_DEPTH_BUFFER_BIT); drawModels(); glBindFramebufferEXT(GL_FRAMEBUFFER_EXT, 0); glBindTexture(GL_TEXTURE_2D, renderTextureID[0]); glEnable(GL_SCISSOR_TEST); glViewport(windowWidth/2, 0, fboWidth, fboHeight); glScissor(windowWidth/2, 0, fboWidth, fboHeight); glMatrixMode(GL_PROJECTION); glLoadIdentity(); glMatrixMode(GL_MODELVIEW); glLoadIdentity(); glBegin(GL_QUADS); glTexCoord2i(0, 0); glVertex2f(-1.0f, -1.0f); glTexCoord2i(1, 0); glVertex2f(1.0f, -1.0f); glTexCoord2i(1, 1); glVertex2f(1.0f, 1.0f); glTexCoord2i(0, 1); glVertex2f(-1.0f, 1.0f); glEnd(); glDisable(GL_SCISSOR_TEST); glutSwapBuffers(); The result is a yellow square. Draw models draws yellow wireframe cubes if not using the FBO so the problem is not that. I've read a previous similar post that talks about using glTexParameterf after generating and binding textures but i've done this. Thanks...

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• Weird order when painting triangle outlines using GL_LINE_STRIP

  - by RayDeeA

  I'm developing an app for iOS-Plaftorms using OpenGL. Currently I'm having a weird issue when painting a plane (terrain) which consists of multiple subplanes, where each subplane consists of 2 triangles forming a rect. I'm painting this terrain as a wireframe by using a call to glDrawElements and provide the parameters GL_Line_Strip and the precalculated indices. The problem is that the triangles get painted in the wrong order or are rather vertically mirrored. They do not get painted in the order how I specified the indices, which is confusing. This is the simplified code to generate the vertices: for(NSInteger y = - gridSegmentsY / 2; y < gridSegmentsY / 2; y ++) { for(NSInteger x = - gridSegmentsX / 2; x < gridSegmentsX / 2; x ++) { vertices[pos++] = x * 5; vertices[pos++] = y * 5; vertices[pos++] = 0; } } This is how I generate the indices including degenerated ones (To use as IBO). pos = 0; for(int y = 0; y < gridSegmentsY - 1; y ++) { if (y > 0) { // Degenerate begin: repeat first vertex indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)(y * gridSegmentsY); } for(int x = 0; x < gridSegmentsX; x++) { // One part of the strip indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)((y * gridSegmentsY) + x); indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)(((y + 1) * gridSegmentsY) + x); } if (y < gridSegmentsY - 2) { // Degenerate end: repeat last vertex indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)(((y + 1) * gridSegmentsY) + (gridSegmentsX - 1)); } } So in this part... indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)((y * gridSegmentsY) + x); indices[pos++] = (unsigned short)(((y + 1) * gridSegmentsY) + x); ...I'm setting the first index in the indices array to point to the current (x,y) and the next index to (x,y+1). I'm doin' this for all x's in the current strip, then I'm handling degenerated triangles and repeat this procedure for the next strip (y+1). This method is taken from http://www.learnopengles.com/android-lesson-eight-an-introduction-to-index-buffer-objects-ibos/ So I expect the resulting mesh to get painted like: a----b----c | /| /| | / | / | | / | / | |/ |/ | d----e----f | /| /| | / | / | | / | / | |/ |/ | g----h----i by painting it as described using: glDrawElements(GL_LINE_STRIP, indexCount, GL_UNSIGNED_SHORT, 0); ...since I expect GL_Line_Strip to paint first a line from (a-d), then from (d-b), then (b, e)... and so on (as specified in the indices calculation) But what actually gets painted is: *----*----* |\ |\ | | \ | \ | | \ | \ | | \| \| *----*----* |\ |\ | | \ | \ | | \ | \ | | \| \| *----*----* So the triangles are somehow painted in the wrong order and I need to know why? ;). Does somebody know? Does the problem lie in using GL_Line_Strip or is there a bug in my code? My eye is at (0.0f, 0.0f, 20.0f) and looks at (0,0,0). The mesh is painted along the x-axis & y-axis from left to right with z = 0, so the mesh should not be flipped or anything.

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• MVC Automatic Menu

  - by Nuri Halperin

  An ex-colleague of mine used to call his SQL script generator "Super-Scriptmatic 2000". It impressed our then boss little, but was fun to say and use. We called every batch job and script "something 2000" from that day on. I'm tempted to call this one Menu-Matic 2000, except it's waaaay past 2000. Oh well. The problem: I'm developing a bunch of stuff in MVC. There's no PM to generate mounds of requirements and there's no Ux Architect to create wireframe. During development, things change. Specifically, actions get renamed, moved from controller x to y etc. Well, as the site grows, it becomes a major pain to keep a static menu up to date, because the links change. The HtmlHelper doesn't live up to it's name and provides little help. How do I keep this growing list of pesky little forgotten actions reigned in? The general plan is: Decorate every action you want as a menu item with a custom attribute Reflect out all menu items into a structure at load time Render the menu using as CSS  friendly <ul><li> HTML. The MvcMenuItemAttribute decorates an action, designating it to be included as a menu item: [AttributeUsage(AttributeTargets.Method, AllowMultiple = true)] public class MvcMenuItemAttribute : Attribute {   public string MenuText { get; set; }   public int Order { get; set; }   public string ParentLink { get; set; }   internal string Controller { get; set; }   internal string Action { get; set; }     #region ctor   public MvcMenuItemAttribute(string menuText) : this(menuText, 0) { } public MvcMenuItemAttribute(string menuText, int order) { MenuText = menuText; Order = order; }       internal string Link { get { return string.Format("/{0}/{1}", Controller, this.Action); } }   internal MvcMenuItemAttribute ParentItem { get; set; } #endregion } The MenuText allows overriding the text displayed on the menu. The Order allows the items to be ordered. The ParentLink allows you to make this item a child of another menu item. An example action could then be decorated thusly: [MvcMenuItem("Tracks", Order = 20, ParentLink = "/Session/Index")] . All pretty straightforward methinks. The challenge with menu hierarchy becomes fairly apparent when you try to render a menu and highlight the "current" item or render a breadcrumb control. Both encounter an  ambiguity if you allow a data source to have more than one menu item with the same URL link. The issue is that there is no great way to tell which link a person click. Using referring URL will fail if a user bookmarked the page. Using some extra query string to disambiguate duplicate URLs essentially changes the links, and also ads a chance of collision with other query parameters. Besides, that smells. The stock ASP.Net sitemap provider simply disallows duplicate URLS. I decided not to, and simply pick the first one encountered as the "current". Although it doesn't solve the issue completely – one might say they wanted the second of the 2 links to be "current"- it allows one to include a link twice (home->deals and products->deals etc), and the logic of deciding "current" is easy enough to explain to the customer. Now that we got that out of the way, let's build the menu data structure: public static List<MvcMenuItemAttribute> ListMenuItems(Assembly assembly) { var result = new List<MvcMenuItemAttribute>(); foreach (var type in assembly.GetTypes()) { if (!type.IsSubclassOf(typeof(Controller))) { continue; } foreach (var method in type.GetMethods()) { var items = method.GetCustomAttributes(typeof(MvcMenuItemAttribute), false) as MvcMenuItemAttribute[]; if (items == null) { continue; } foreach (var item in items) { if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(item.Controller)) { item.Controller = type.Name.Substring(0, type.Name.Length - "Controller".Length); } if (String.IsNullOrEmpty(item.Action)) { item.Action = method.Name; } result.Add(item); } } } return result.OrderBy(i => i.Order).ToList(); } Using reflection, the ListMenuItems method takes an assembly (you will hand it your MVC web assembly) and generates a list of menu items. It digs up all the types, and for each one that is an MVC Controller, digs up the methods. Methods decorated with the MvcMenuItemAttribute get plucked and added to the output list. Again, pretty simple. To make the structure hierarchical, a LINQ expression matches up all the items to their parent: public static void RegisterMenuItems(List<MvcMenuItemAttribute> items) { _MenuItems = items; _MenuItems.ForEach(i => i.ParentItem = items.FirstOrDefault(p => String.Equals(p.Link, i.ParentLink, StringComparison.InvariantCultureIgnoreCase))); } The _MenuItems is simply an internal list to keep things around for later rendering. Finally, to package the menu building for easy consumption: public static void RegisterMenuItems(Type mvcApplicationType) { RegisterMenuItems(ListMenuItems(Assembly.GetAssembly(mvcApplicationType))); } To bring this puppy home, a call in Global.asax.cs Application_Start() registers the menu. Notice the ugliness of reflection is tucked away from the innocent developer. All they have to do is call the RegisterMenuItems() and pass in the type of the application. When you use the new project template, global.asax declares a class public class MvcApplication : HttpApplication and that is why the Register call passes in that type. protected void Application_Start() { AreaRegistration.RegisterAllAreas(); RegisterRoutes(RouteTable.Routes);   MvcMenu.RegisterMenuItems(typeof(MvcApplication)); }   What else is left to do? Oh, right, render! public static void ShowMenu(this TextWriter output) { var writer = new HtmlTextWriter(output);   renderHierarchy(writer, _MenuItems, null); }   public static void ShowBreadCrumb(this TextWriter output, Uri currentUri) { var writer = new HtmlTextWriter(output); string currentLink = "/" + currentUri.GetComponents(UriComponents.Path, UriFormat.Unescaped);   var menuItem = _MenuItems.FirstOrDefault(m => m.Link.Equals(currentLink, StringComparison.CurrentCultureIgnoreCase)); if (menuItem != null) { renderBreadCrumb(writer, _MenuItems, menuItem); } }   private static void renderBreadCrumb(HtmlTextWriter writer, List<MvcMenuItemAttribute> menuItems, MvcMenuItemAttribute current) { if (current == null) { return; } var parent = current.ParentItem; renderBreadCrumb(writer, menuItems, parent); writer.Write(current.MenuText); writer.Write(" / ");   }     static void renderHierarchy(HtmlTextWriter writer, List<MvcMenuItemAttribute> hierarchy, MvcMenuItemAttribute root) { if (!hierarchy.Any(i => i.ParentItem == root)) return;   writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Ul); foreach (var current in hierarchy.Where(element => element.ParentItem == root).OrderBy(i => i.Order)) { if (ItemFilter == null || ItemFilter(current)) {   writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.Li); writer.AddAttribute(HtmlTextWriterAttribute.Href, current.Link); writer.AddAttribute(HtmlTextWriterAttribute.Alt, current.MenuText); writer.RenderBeginTag(HtmlTextWriterTag.A); writer.WriteEncodedText(current.MenuText); writer.RenderEndTag(); // link renderHierarchy(writer, hierarchy, current); writer.RenderEndTag(); // li } } writer.RenderEndTag(); // ul } The ShowMenu method renders the menu out to the provided TextWriter. In previous posts I've discussed my partiality to using well debugged, time test HtmlTextWriter to render HTML rather than writing out angled brackets by hand. In addition, writing out using the actual writer on the actual stream rather than generating string and byte intermediaries (yes, StringBuilder being no exception) disturbs me. To carry out the rendering of an hierarchical menu, the recursive renderHierarchy() is used. You may notice that an ItemFilter is called before rendering each item. I figured that at some point one might want to exclude certain items from the menu based on security role or context or something. That delegate is the hook for such future feature. To carry out rendering of a breadcrumb recursion is used again, this time simply to unwind the parent hierarchy from the leaf node, then rendering on the return from the recursion rather than as we go along deeper. I guess I was stuck in LISP that day.. recursion is fun though.   Now all that is left is some usage! Open your Site.Master or wherever you'd like to place a menu or breadcrumb, and plant one of these calls: <% MvcMenu.ShowBreadCrumb(this.Writer, Request.Url); %> to show a breadcrumb trail (notice lack of "=" after <% and the semicolon). <% MvcMenu.ShowMenu(Writer); %> to show the menu.   As mentioned before, the HTML output is nested <UL> <LI> tags, which should make it easy to style using abundant CSS to produce anything from static horizontal or vertical to dynamic drop-downs.   This has been quite a fun little implementation and I was pleased that the code size remained low. The main crux was figuring out how to pass parent information from the attribute to the hierarchy builder because attributes have restricted parameter types. Once I settled on that implementation, the rest falls into place quite easily.

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