IShaderManager Class Reference

This reference page is linked to from the following overview topics: Porting Advanced Material and Texture Map Plug-ins to Nitrous.

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Detailed Description

Represents the programmable shader associated with a material or texture map plug-in.

Materials and texture maps can use programmable shaders to describe their appearance when displayed in the Nitrous viewport and rendered with Quicksilver. Programmable shaders allow for a more realistic and complex visual appearance than ISimpleMaterial does. Note that 3ds Max 2012 only supports MetaSL shaders.

Plug-ins do not need to derive from IShaderManager. They rather need to create instances of it using IShaderManagerCreator::CreateShaderManager(), one for each shader they support. 3ds Max will query the plug-in for its IShaderManager via a request for the interface identified by ISHADER_MANAGER_INTERFACE_ID. Typically a plug-in would create an instance of IShaderManager in response to this request in its override of Animatable::GetInterface(Interface_ID) and delete it in its destructor by calling IShaderManagerCreator::DeleteShaderManager(). The following code snippet illustrates how a plug-in manages its IShaderManager instance:

    #include <graphics\IShaderManager.h>
    // A material plug-in that has a shader
    class MyMtlPlugin : public MtlBase {
    private:
        IShaderManager* mShaderManager;
    public:
        MyMtlPlugin() : mShaderManager(NULL) { 
            // It's not recommended to create the IShaderManager in the plug-in's constructor 
            // since the shader manager needs a pointer to the plug-in, which hasn't been
            // fully constructed yet. Therefore calls the shader manager may make to 
            // virtual methods of the plug-in may lead to a crash.
        }
        ~MyMtlPlugin() {
            // Do not call the delete operator in mShaderManager, ask IShaderManagerCreator 
            // to destroy it properly.
            IShaderManagerCreator::GetInstance()->DeleteShaderManager(mpManager);
            mpManager = NULL;
        }

        BaseInterface* GetInterface(Interface_ID iid) {
            if (ISHADER_MANAGER_INTERFACE_ID == iid)
                // In case the plug-in may have several shaders with one IShaderManager 
                // instance for each, it will need to make sure that the IShaderManager
                // interface pointer that is returned corresponds to the currently active 
                // shader.
                return GetShaderManager();
            else
                return MtlBase::GetInterface(iid);
        }

        IShaderManager* GetShaderManager() {
            if (mpManager == NULL) {
                mpManager = IShaderManagerCreator::GetInstance()->CreateShaderManager(
                    IShaderManager::ShaderTypeMetaSL, 
                    _M("MetaSL shader class name"), // same class name as found in the shader file
                    _M("Fully qualified shader file path") // Full path to a xmsl shader file
                    this);
            }
            return mpManager;
        }
    };

The parameters of the shader need to be fed with values from the parameters of the material or texture map plug-in. This process is facilitated by class IParameterTranslator that plug-ins need to implement.

See also:

IParameterTranslator

#include <IShaderManager.h>

Inheritance diagram for IShaderManager:

List of all members.

Public Types
enum	ShaderType { ShaderTypeMetaSL = 0 }
	Supported shader types. More...
Public Member Functions
virtual Interface_ID	GetID ()
	Retrieves the interface ID of IShaderManager.
virtual ShaderType	GetShaderType () const =0
	Retrieves the shader's type.
virtual const MCHAR *	GetShaderClassName () const =0
	Retrieves the shader's class name.
virtual const MCHAR *	GetShaderFile () const =0
	Retrieves the fully qualified path of the shader file.

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Member Enumeration Documentation

enum ShaderType

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Supported shader types.

Enumerator:

ShaderTypeMetaSL

MetaSL shader. Search for all occurrences

    {
        ShaderTypeMetaSL = 0, 
    };

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Member Function Documentation

virtual Interface_ID GetID

(

)

[inline, virtual]

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Retrieves the interface ID of IShaderManager.

Reimplemented from BaseInterface.

{ return ISHADER_MANAGER_INTERFACE_ID; }

virtual ShaderType GetShaderType

(

)

const [pure virtual]

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Retrieves the shader's type.

virtual const MCHAR* GetShaderClassName

(

)

const [pure virtual]

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Retrieves the shader's class name.

virtual const MCHAR* GetShaderFile

(

)

const [pure virtual]

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Retrieves the fully qualified path of the shader file.