[vtkusers] SDF (SImple Data Format) reader

[H.Vidal, Jr.]

A quick search on SDF, Simple Data Format, with and without VTK
(via google, in any case) *suggests* that this has not been 'done'
out of the box. However, there are Perl modules for reading SDF,
and there are quite a few docs describing SDF, so build a little
C or Fortran to read/parse these does not seem hard.

 From the other side, if you know what representation you want
in VTK inasmuch as datasets of known depth, dimensions, etc.
it's pretty easy to use VTK methods to allocate objects of a known
size/dims, then load same with data parsed/gotten from another source.

The rest is a Simple Matter of Programming, but it does not seem to
be too hard, given SDF's simplicity. The learning curve on VTK is
probably steeper.

Unless there is a ready-made SDF reader class available to VTK, you
probably can't just glue a header onto these files and expect things
'to work' without aforementioned level of coding.

Not very helpful, I suppose, but at least descriptive enough to
get you started. Good luck.

H. Vidal, Jr.
Tesseract Technology

Jack Gundrum wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I am new to VTK, but would like to read into VTK some data from a 
> blackhole simulation that was written in a binary format called SDF.
> 
> The format can be read with OpenDX and is described by the following:
> 
> points = 9224
> format = lsb ieee
> interleaving = field
> field = mass, locations, velocity, u, h, rho, phi, nbrs, ident, smom, 
> gamma, enthalpy
> structure = scalar, 3-vector, 3-vector, scalar, scalar, scalar, scalar, 
> scalar, scalar, 4-vector, scalar, scalar
> type = float, float, float, float, float, float, float, unsigned int, 
> unsigned int, float, float, float
> 
> How would I read this into VTK? Is there a reader or a header I could 
> add to the files that would work?
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