From: Andy Gombos
To: Martin Baker
Subject: .NET is more than MS platforms (and an unrelated question)
Date: 08 December 2002 22:27

Hi,

On your pages about mjbWorld, you state that .NET is a Microsoft only solution, however, that is not the case. For instance, http://www.go-mono.com/ (Mono) is an open source version of the .NET runtimes for Linux. There are others I have heard of, but cannot find links oof hand.

I came to your pages originally looking for vertex normal calculation, and the page you provide is very good. However, I have a question doing this with J3D and a vertex list. Will it work to create a Vector3f off each point, then cross multiply and normalize the resulting vector? I keep screwing the calculation up, so my surfaces appear black when shaded.

Thanks,
Andy

---

From: Martin Baker
To: Andy Gombos
Subject: Re: .NET is more than MS platforms (and an unrelated question)
Date: 09 December 2002 17:45

Andy,

> On your pages about mjbWorld, you state that .NET is a Microsoft only
solution,
> however, that is not the case. For instance, http://www.go-mono.com/
(Mono)
> is an open source version of the .NET runtimes for Linux. There are
others I have
> heard of, but cannot find links oof hand.

Thanks for letting me know about this, I did hear something about Mono, but
I didn't know it was yet a working solution. Ill have a look at their site,
have you tried it? If so what do you think of it? I'll also update my web
page and include your message if that's alright.

>I came to your pages originally looking for vertex normal calculation,
> and the page you provide is very good. However, I have a question
> doing this with J3D and a vertex list. Will it work to create a Vector3f
> off each point, then cross multiply and normalize the resulting vector?
> I keep screwing the calculation up, so my surfaces appear black when
> shaded.

I don't see why it shouldn't work with Vector3f, what sort of values are you
getting? Its easy to get it facing the wrong way, have you tried reversing
it? Also are you getting the order of the coordinates right? (winding order)
as that can cause surfaces to appear black.

Martin

---

From: Andy Gombos
To: Martin Baker
Subject: Re: .NET is more than MS platforms (and an unrelated question)
Date: 09 December 2002 21:02

> Andy,
>
> > On your pages about mjbWorld, you state that .NET is a Microsoft only
> solution,
> > however, that is not the case. For instance, http://www.go-mono.com/
> (Mono)
> > is an open source version of the .NET runtimes for Linux. There are
> others I have
> > heard of, but cannot find links oof hand.
>
> Thanks for letting me know about this, I did hear something about Mono,
but
> I didn't know it was yet a working solution. Ill have a look at their
site,
> have you tried it? If so what do you think of it? I'll also update my web
> page and include your message if that's alright.

I haven't tried it (I only run Windows boxes, and my Linux install was
removed about a year ago). From other people I hear that it is fairly well
developed.

>
> >I came to your pages originally looking for vertex normal calculation,
> > and the page you provide is very good. However, I have a question
> > doing this with J3D and a vertex list. Will it work to create a
Vector3f
> > off each point, then cross multiply and normalize the resulting vector?
> > I keep screwing the calculation up, so my surfaces appear black when
> > shaded.
>
> I don't see why it shouldn't work with Vector3f, what sort of values are
you
> getting? Its easy to get it facing the wrong way, have you tried reversing
> it? Also are you getting the order of the coordinates right? (winding
order)
> as that can cause surfaces to appear black.

I was getting a completely black shape when adding light, but I reordered
the coordinates so 1 side and a few isolated pieces of the back show
correctly. When I use NormalGenerator to calculate the normals, it always
appears black, though I can see the triangles blotting out a ColorCube
placed where the light is. My original manual calculation also makes the
surface appear black, so I'll try flipping them. Thanks!

Andy