Detecting Shader Families

To find what shader families are defined on an existing shader definition

Use ShaderDef.ShaderFamilies or ShaderDef::GetShaderFamilies to retrieve a safearray of strings:
```
for sFamily in oShaderDef.ShaderFamilies :
	Application.LogMessage(sFamily)
	# ...
```

To find out the primary family defined on an existing shader definition

Use ShaderDef.PrimaryShaderFamily or ShaderDef::GetPrimaryShaderFamily to return the shader family ID as a string:
```
Application.LogMessage(oShaderDef.PrimaryShaderFamily)
```

To find out whether the specified family is defined as one of the shader families for an existing shader definition

Use ShaderDef.IsShaderFamily or ShaderDef::IsShaderFamily with one of the native Softimage shader families or a custom shader family you defined:
```
if (oShaderDef.IsShaderFamily("mrLight")) :
	# do something with light shaders
else :
	# do something with non-light shaders
```

To assign registered shader families to a custom shader definitions

Use ShaderDef.AddShaderFamily or ShaderDef::AddShaderFamily, passing the shader family name for each shader family you want to add; however, the second parameter determines whether that family will be primary or not. So if you don't pass a value for that parameter, the last family added will be considered the primary family:

# Adds the lens shader family only
oShaderDef.AddShaderFamily(siShaderFamilyLens)

# Adds the data blob and texture families with texture as primary (because it's 
# the most versatile shader family--it has the fewest connection restrictions of anything)
oShaderDef.AddShaderFamily(siShaderFamilyTexture, True)
oShaderDef.AddShaderFamily(siShaderFamilyData, False)

# Same thing but without specifying second parameter
oShaderDef.AddShaderFamily(siShaderFamilyData)
oShaderDef.AddShaderFamily(siShaderFamilyTexture)

Note

To register a custom shader family in Softimage, see Creating Custom Shader Families. To use one of the native Softimage shader families, consult Native Softimage Shader Families for a list of supported families.

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