2015 year in review for the Softimage mailing list


2015_softimage_list_word_cloud

539 topics, 4055 posts, 271 different posters

Top 25 Threads
*number of posts in bold

  1. Maya thinks they’re clever….and that’s the problem 92
  2. Introducing Canvas – visual programming for Fabric Engine 2.0 59
  3. Get rid of your flip phone and get current on maya! 58
  4. H14 is out ! 56
  5. Is purchasing a new softimage license impossible? 53
  6. Continued use of Softimage question 50
  7. OT: Hypershade changes in Maya 2016 46
  8. Friday Flashback #223 46
  9. test 41
  10. can I still get softimage? 40
  11. Heavy scenes with the GTX 970 40
  12. GATOR – A feature in Softimage since 2008 38
  13. Soft licenses still available for purchase? 36
  14. Very OT: for the love of your career.. try houdini 36
  15. akeytsu animation software demo 36
  16. “”The shadow over The Foundry”” 36
  17. Maya freelance list 35
  18. OT: Epic going completely crazy 33
  19. Downloading Entertainment Creation Suite 33
  20. OT: Modo 901 Sneak Peek 32
  21. [PLUG] mGear Teaser 31
  22. Have a question an alternative tool 31
  23. End of the ride 31
  24. Maya graph dependencies 28
  25. OT’ish: Redshift renderfarm with Softimage setup? 27

Top 25 Posters
* number of posts in bold

  1. Jason S 132
  2. Pierre Schiller 125
  3. Morten Bartholdy 117
  4. Eric Thivierge 98
  5. Raffaele Fragapane 94
  6. Matt Lind 94
  7. Mirko Jankovic 91
  8. Sebastien Sterling 85
  9. Leendert A. Hartog 84
  10. Stephen Blair 82
  11. Olivier Jeannel 80
  12. Gerbrand Nel 79
  13. Mario Reitbauer 78
  14. Luc-Eric Rousseau 72
  15. Sven Constable 70
  16. Ponthieux, Joseph G. 68
  17. Angus Davidson 63
  18. Tim Leydecker 61
  19. Eric Turman 60
  20. Chris Marshall 54
  21. Nicolas Esposito 53
  22. peter_b 52
  23. Jordi Bares Dominguez 49
  24. Steven Caron 48
  25. Francisco Criado 48

Wednesday word cloud: DSScripts functions


There are 770 functions in the VBS files in $XSI_HOME\Application\DSScripts. Here’s a word cloud of the function names. To create the word cloud, I took the camel-case names like SetCameraSequencerLayoutProc and split them into Set, Camera, Sequencer, Layout, and Proc.

Proc indicates a function that is the implementation of a command. So the command SetCameraSequencerLayout would ultimately end up running SetCameraSequencerLayoutProc. So you see a lot of commands are actually implemented in VBS 🙂

dsscripts_functions

Wednesday word cloud: Softimage scripting commands


This word cloud shows the scripting names of the commands in Application.Commands (Softimage 2013 SP1)
CommandScriptingNames_2013sp1
You can see that some scripting names are repeated quite a few times:

  • ApplyTopoOp (66)
  • ApplyOp (47)
  • ApplyGenOp (44)
  • ToggleValue (43)
  • ApplyShader (37)

Some scripting commands, like Insert Curve Knot, are instances of a generic command like ApplyTopoOp:
InsertCurveKnotDescription
but with hard-coded arguments:
InsertCurveKnotArguments

See also Why ApplyOp doesn’t pop up a PPG.

Here’s a list of the TopoOp commands:

for c in Application.Commands:
	if c.ScriptingName == "ApplyTopoOp":
		print "%s : %s" % (c.ScriptingName, c.Name )
		
# ApplyTopoOp : Apply Topology Operator
# ApplyTopoOp : Insert Curve Knot
# ApplyTopoOp : Subdivide Edge
# ApplyTopoOp : Raise Nurbs Curve Degree
# ApplyTopoOp : Extrude Comp. Axis
# ApplyTopoOp : Filter Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Collapse
# ApplyTopoOp : Inset Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Subdivide Polygon
# ApplyTopoOp : Slice Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Offset Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Dice Object
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Snip
# ApplyTopoOp : Invert Selected Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Delete Trim
# ApplyTopoOp : Duplicate Polygons Along Curve
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Remove Knot
# ApplyTopoOp : Extrude Component Along Normal
# ApplyTopoOp : Dissolve Component
# ApplyTopoOp : Boolean Difference
# ApplyTopoOp : Boolean Union
# ApplyTopoOp : Boolean Intersection
# ApplyTopoOp : Local Subdivision
# ApplyTopoOp : Insert Surface Knot
# ApplyTopoOp : Remove Surface Knot
# ApplyTopoOp : Polygon Reduction
# ApplyTopoOp : Bevel
# ApplyTopoOp : Delete Component
# ApplyTopoOp : Quadrangulate
# ApplyTopoOp : Dissolve & Clean Adjacent Vertices
# ApplyTopoOp : Symmetrize Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Disconnect Component
# ApplyTopoOp : Set Curve Knot Multiplicity
# ApplyTopoOp : Bridge Edges
# ApplyTopoOp : Apply DelMeshPoint
# ApplyTopoOp : Invert All Normals
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Inverse
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Shift
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Shift
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Curve Shift
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Swap
# ApplyTopoOp : Filter Edges
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Reparameterize
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Reparameterize
# ApplyTopoOp : Add Edge
# ApplyTopoOp : Add Polygon
# ApplyTopoOp : Nurbs Curve Delete Point
# ApplyTopoOp : Nurbs Surface Delete Point
# ApplyTopoOp : Mesh Surface Delete Point
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Open/Close
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Open/Close
# ApplyTopoOp : Delete Edge
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Stitch
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Extend to Curve
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Clean
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Stitch
# ApplyTopoOp : Curve Clean
# ApplyTopoOp : Surface Curve Inverse
# ApplyTopoOp : Extrude Component Along Curve
# ApplyTopoOp : Weld Edges
# ApplyTopoOp : Filter Points
# ApplyTopoOp : Weld Points to Target
# ApplyTopoOp : Delete Particle
# ApplyTopoOp : Trim by Projection
# ApplyTopoOp : Dice Polygons
# ApplyTopoOp : Bridge Polygon	

Wednesday word cloud: Autodesk NDA


Another Wednesday, another word cloud. This time, for the Autodesk NDA (Non-Disclosure Agreement) that all attendees must sign if they want to attend the next Softimage Creatives user group, where Autodesk Softimage Product Manager Cory Mogk will be presenting.

wordcloud_autodesk_nda_50

In this document of 1983 words, the top words are:

  • autodesk (53)
  • receiving (46)
  • information (46)
  • party (41)
  • confidential (39)
  • agreement (30)

In other words, these are the top words and phrases: “autodesk”, “receiving party”, “confidential information”, and “agreement”. Nothing surprising there.

Wednesday word clouds – 2012 activity on the Softimage mailing list


Two word clouds to help visualize the activity on the Softimage mailing list during 2012: who was posting, and what were they posting about?

What were the popular topics?
Note that I removed “Softimage”, which was by far the most common word in the post titles (aka Subject), but which doesn’t really indicate the topic of discussion.
wc_subject_50_no_Softimage

Who was active on the list?
There were approximately 450 different people who posted during 2012. This word cloud shows the 100 top names, so assuming most people have no middle names, this is more-or-less the 50 most active posters on the list.
wc_from_100