Beyond Computing

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2009-10-24T14:43:00.006+02:00

PCI (Peripheral Component Interconnection)

2006-09-15T14:32:00.001+02:00

This is inside PC world called second PC bus generation, because ISA is considered first generation. Usualy bus is designed to last for 10-15 years which ISA accomplished. Intel made big mistake with VLB bus, it was orientated to one type of mircoProcessors, so they suggested universal solution that is connected to intern bus over microProcessor with Host Bridge, which is actually adjusting unit. That means that bus is phisicaly and logicaly and electricaly separated from microProcessor, so type of microProcessor doesn't jeopardise bus. Standard was promoved in 1992 and held until today, even if has been extended. Standard PCI bus is 32-bit and runs on 33,3 MHz nad is present at 99,9% PC MotherBoards (MB). Besides, there are numberous variants that work on 66, 100 and 133 MHz, like 64-bit version of PCI, but this soulutions are used ostly on server computers and graphics work stations.

PCI bus brins much better performanses according to VLB bus, beforeall thanks to specific improvements like:
- Burst Mode, possibility of data transmition into burst mode, which presents block transfer of data array
- Bus Mastering, possibility of PCI device to take control over bus and to make data transmission direct. This is first bus that popularised Bus Mastering, before O.S. and applications could use that advantage.
PCI bus allows same time bus mastering of more devices, with kind of work that non device on bus can block other device.
- High bandwidth PCI 2.1 specification (64-bit), which works on 66 MHz, makes first standards bandwidth 4 times larger. But this specification is mostly used on professional systems, on this specification AGP was based.

With grow of bus frequency, problem of signal synhronization on bus becomes complex. Extendion of work frequency is negatively reflect on signal wave form on bus and advent of late because capacitive character comes to expression of bus load and nus-capacity of semiconductor units. PCI bus allows up to 10 standard capcacity duty loads, 5 plugged modules into PCI slots (1 PCI modul treat as 2 capacity duty loads).

Graphics card types

2006-09-14T23:19:00.002+02:00

With bus development, specific graphics cards appeared on marked, so today we can find:

PCI graphics cards
AGP graphics cards
PCI-E graphics cards

PCI graphics cards, today are very little in use, 'cause of relatively weak bandwidth of PCI bus, but they used very good, and may be still in use for users that use only office application, and other graphicaly low-requirement softwares. But, with appearence of "realistic" 3D games, which made first 3D objects, not 2D pictures,hardware acceleration was invented, which means 3D rendering directly through hardware not with software emulation. First cards, then called 3D accelerators, PCI bus was just about enough. When new tecnologies were found, and with speed acceleration, there was need for faster bus. Therefore AGP was developed

AGP cards usualy posses hardware acceleration, and also larger amounts of memory then PCI graphics cards, and with that, they are faster. AGP graphics cards today have bigger part of market, but AGP bus is reached its maximum, like other buses that use parallel datatransmission. Therefore it is expected that PCI Express bus, that is serial, in near future stoppes being primary and only, so AGP graphics cards today are eaven not produced, they started making only PCI-E versions.

Arhitecture

2006-09-14T20:41:00.003+02:00

Pipeline

Pipeline coud be described as production line. Therefore, production of something is devided into phases of production which get united and at the and final product is there. Similiar example of pipeline is production line of cars. At first production of body, then paintjob, then installing parts, and all that on one production line, or pipeline.
Pipeline speed depends upon slowest phase. For example, when producing cars, if installing of parts lasts 3 minutes and all other phases take 2 minutes, then all other phases must wait that one minute before they come to the next phase. Therefore in pipeline example parts installing is bottleneck because this determins speed of whole production.

This pipeline as described in example is located also in computer graphics. Graphics pipeline performed in real-time can be devided into 3 basic phases shown here:

Basic GPU pipeline look

Those phazes are Application, Geometry and Rasterizer. Every each phase is actually pipline for itself because it is consisted of few subphases. Slowest phase of pipeline determines picture drawing speed, fps (frames per second).

Application phase
Like named, application phase is started by software (application). This phase has collision detection, accelerator algorithms, animacion & stuff. Here user can have influence on models (ex. game characters). Also, developer (person that develops some software) has total control about application events because it is after all his developing product.

Geometry phase
Geometry phase can be software or hardware, depending on arhitecture, and it deals with geometric transformation - rotations, translations, scaling, projections, lightning etc. This phase actually calculates what will be drawn, how should it be drawn and where should it be drawn.
Geometry phase is devided to several subphases (those subphases are actually numbers of coordinate systems):

Subphases inside geometric phase

Model coordinates
- every object is modeled in its coordinate system
- It is mostly supposed that objects are presented with triangle, square or polygon
- objects can be modeled with "splines" or with NURBS (Non-Uniformal Rational B Splines, mathematic technique with using polinoms to describe smooth surfaces) but within drawing phase (render time) they are being converted to polygons.

3D world Coordinates
- integration place
- all objects have to be moved to same coordinating system
- at every moment lightning parametars must be specified

Eye/Camera/View coordinate system - coordinated system of camera/viewer
- at this moment scene viewing point is being chosen
- coordinates are being converted so persone watches upstream of specific axis
- Usualy this is z-axis with x-axis on right side, and y-axis upwards. This transformation ease later transformation 3D picture to 2D screen.

Clipping Coordinate System
- this is projection transforming phase
- determins view volume, viewable part of space. Every points must be transformed according to projection. Normalization is necessary, because all coordinates must be between 0 and 1 (DirectX) or -1 and +1 (OpenGL)

Normalized Device Coordinates
- cutting is being done
- it is being projected from 3D to 2D, from already normalised cube, z-axis is remembered for deph determination

2D screen Coordinate system
- vectors are converted to pixels
- at this moment texturing and elimination of hidden surfaces is being done
- anti-aliasing also can be done after this phase

Rasterizer phase
This phase draws, renders (rendering), picture onto screen based on data generated in previous phase.
Pipeline is just like at CPU, basic working method of graphics processors. Pipeline phase can also be paralel so execution speed is higher.

Parallelism

Other way for getting fast graphics is parallelism which can be made in geometry phase and raster phase. Idea of this kind of work is that at the same time, is made more results and then in later phase, to be combined. Parallelism working method of graphics is presented here:

Bsic GPU parallel arhitecture

On picture datas from application phase come into geometry phase where are application phase results shared to minor graphics units (G), and eash geometric unit process graphics part (ex. projection). Then those results are sent to rasterizer units (R) for further processing.

But, as more results is parallel processed, some kind of hierarchy is needed so parallel units together give image that user wanted. This hierarchy can execute anywhere in pipeline which gives 4 different sorts of hierarchy, which are: Sort-First, Sort-Middle, Sort-LastFragmentt, Sort-Last Image.

Parallel graphics arhitecture

Raster phase is consisted with two inner phases: Fragment generation (FG) and Fragment merge (FM). FG does real location within basic elements and pass them to FM that compounds results into one. Texturing is mostly done either at the begining of FG or at the end of FM

Sort-first
- pile basic elements before entering into geometry phase

Sort-middle
- after geometry phase location on every basic screen element is known and can be passed to raster units (FG and FM)

Sort-last image
- after raster phase everything is compounding

Sort-last fragment
- compounds fragments after FG before FM fragment compoundation

RAMDAC

2006-09-12T10:02:00.001+02:00

All graphics cards have RAMDAC, chip that converts digital signals to analog. CRT monitors work with analog singlas. PC works with digital signals, that are sent to graphics card. Before these signals are forwarded to monitor they need to be converted to analog output signals, which is RAMDACs job. That is process of conversion digital signal in analog signal of specific voltage, which is defined for every color. There is D/A (DAC) convertor for each of basic colors, which monitor uses for creation of color palette. Result is correct "mixture" of colors neded for creating of every each pixel. Speed that RAMDAC would work, and also as design of graphics processor, dictate which max frequency of refresh rate will graphics card support, as number of colors that will be able to show on specific rezolution.

Video memory

2006-09-11T18:20:00.001+02:00

Memory that stores datas which are shown and which will be presented on screen are called video memory and it is usualy implemented on graphics card itself. First graphics cards used standard dynamic memory, but that requested constant refresh of memory content. Consequences were reducition of performances, which could be seen with slight increase of frequencies of GPU and GPU.

Advantage of video memory implementation is very high possibility of adjusment for specific purpuses, which resulted with creation of new memory technologies. Video RAM is special type of dynamic memory that allowed momental reading and writing of datas. It also doesn't demand big refresh rate, like standard dynamic memory, which gives much better work performanses like standard dynamic memory, which can give better performances.

EDO RAM is like ordinary DRAM, with exception that it gives better throughput and can work on higher frequencies. It also accelerates read/write cycle, which execute more efficient then standard dynamic memory.

SDRAM/SGRAM memory is also used on graphics cards. SDRAM allows that memory and graphics processor work on their own frequencies and it is used for efficient gathering and data process, that allows more efficient work then EDO memories. SGRAM is just variation of SDRAM, but is used only as video memory, and it supports read/write blocks and data processing on bit level, which resulted with higher performances. Graphics cards use this memory, but haven't registered significant use.

Today, DDR memory is mostly used in this purpose, aldo there exist modules that use GDDR3 memory which we can find on high end graphics cards where work frequences are higher, so is bigger bandwith for aproximatting of high performanses.

DDR memory for graphics cards we can find in 2 different packages:

-TSOP-II, 66-pin (with 33 pin with both sides), this package is relatively cheap, easy to embedd and manufacture process is fast, thanks to technology improvements.

-FBGA, 144 pin. These memories usualy can have speeds from DDR350 MHz or 400 MHz (effective 700 MHz and 800 MHz). Memories with this package are also embadded on high end graphics cards. It is familiar that DDR memory can work up to maximum frequency of 500 MHz (effective 1 GHz), but those models is very difficult to produce so price of these memories is pretty big.

Because of these reasons, graphics cards that use DDR memory, working frequences memory is set up at 350 MHz, or max 400 MHz as upper limit.

Example of GDDR3 memories on newest graphics cards is pretty universal. GDDR3 technology is equal to DDR2 technology of system memories, and it uses 4-bit preprocessing of datas, which cause for effective frequency to be 4 times bigger then real work frequency, and that is twice as double then equalent DDR memory, and it makes data transmition easier.
Starting work frequencies GDDR3 memory is 500 MHz, and theortethicaly in this moment it is able to reach working frequencies up to 800 MHz. Using only FBGA package, and modules are phisicaly small and don't get heated to much, which allows them to work on bigger frequencies without need for coolers

Therefore, strongest graphics memories today are separated to DDR and GDDR3. Though, future could be XDR and GDDR4 memories that sould offer not just bigger working frequencies, but also bigger memories bandwith that would go up to 100GB/s.

GPU

2006-09-11T10:38:00.000+02:00

GPU - Graphics Processing Unit

These are chips that very efficiently manipulate and show computer graphics, and thanks to their extraordinary structure, they are more efficent from CPUs (Central Processig Units) when are questioned komplex graphics algorithms.

GPU implements numberous simple graphics operations with a way that is possible to execute them much faster then CPU could do. The most basic operation of first 2D oriented graphics cards included BitBLT (Bit Block Transfer), it is acctualy operation that combine 2 images into 1, then operations of drawing of square, triangles, arcs and circles. Modern graphics processors have implemented support for 3D computer graphics. At the beggining they were used for acceleration of intenzive memory requests, like mapping of textures and rendering polygons, later there were added elements that speedup geomethric calcucations like replacing lines into other coordinate systems. Latest improvements on graphics processors includes support for programmabile shaders that can manipulate with lines and textures with many, same operations that CPU supports, like various interpolation techniques that are used for enchancing picture quality.

Graphics processors produced after 1995 support "YUV color space" (today YUV presents the most used system of colors in TV reproduction which is used on PAL and NTSC systems, and its based on better luminance of colors unlike RGB, which YUV was based on (the one that is mostly used in computer graphics) like hardware attachment that is very importante for reproduction of digital video. Meny graphics processors produced after year 2000 support MPEG coding that allowes for better and more efficiant video compression. Newesr graphics cards even can decode video content in real-time by card itself, and with taht they reduce CPU use.

Typical, modern graphics card is connected with CPU and system memory over motherboard, and bus (PCI, AGP, PCI-E). Graphics processor has limmited access to amount of video mamory which is located directly on card, and gives support for lot larger speeds then dynamic RAM. Thats why price of these memories is bigger. Today graphics cards have about 256 MB, 512 MB, even 1 GB video memory, which is sometimes more than amount of system RAM.

Working method

2006-09-11T10:12:00.001+02:00

Graphics cards are important almost as screen (nothing is more important than screen because, it is at the and of chain and can ruin everything). During last decade, graphics cards made tremendous progress when quality comes into question.

Graphics card is acctualy adapter, that is installed on motherboard like swap module. It also can be integrated part on motherboard, which is case in laptops, but there is also relativly big number of desktop computers with integrated graphics card.

Performances of those cards are much weaker then changable module cards, because, after all they use system memory that is much slower then video memory.

Every graphics cards, module or integrated is consisted of 3 components:

Set of video chips, GPU (Graphics Processing Unit) by some manufacture (ATI, nVidia..). Video chips make signal that monitor has to recive so it could format a picture.

Memory can be(EDO, SGRAM, SDRAM, VRAM...), and all these memories are variations of system RAM memories, spcialy optimized for this application. Memory is neccesary, because graphics card must remember all screen image in every moment.

RAMDAC is chip that convets digital/alalog signals.

History

2006-09-10T17:40:00.001+02:00

For last 25 years, graphics cards made unbelivible progress. First graphics card was produced in 1981 by IBM, named MDA (Monochrome Display Adapter) and it could draw only text with white or green color on black screen. Today minimum of standards for new graphics card is VGA (Video Graphics Array) which can draw 256 colors.

VGA is standard designed by IBM and which cloned every other manufactures. It presents minimum that all graphics cards should support, so their drivers could enable their functioning.

SVGA designed VESA (Video Electronics Standards Association) as fulfil of VGA standards allowing bigger resolutions and color number:

800 pixels × 600 pixels = 480,000 pixels
480,000 pixels × 8-bits = 3,840,000 bits
3,840,000 bits ÷ 8 bits per byte = 480,000 bytes = 0.5 MBs

XGA also designed IBM but it is often binded with resolution 1024x768 and support of drawing 65,536 colors, and requires 1.5 MB of video memory:

1024 pixels × 768 pixels = 786,432 pixels
786,432 pixels × 16-bits = 12,582,912 bits
12,582,912 bits ÷ 8 bits per byte = 1,572,864 bytes = 1.5 MBs

SXGA made better XGA standard and brings support for resolutions over 1280x1024 in 24-bit color (16,7 mil colors). Requires minimaly 4 MB of video mamory:

1280 pixels × 1024 pixels = 1,310,720 pixels
1,310,720 pixels × 24-bits = 31,457,280 bits
31,457,280 bits ÷ 8 bits per byte = 3,932,160 bytes = 3.9 MBs

UXGA brings support for resolution of 1600x1200, also presents improvements of XGA standard.

For improving quality of presentation isn't enough just to make resolution larger, but also color number must be larger
Za poboljšanje kvalitete prikaza nije dovoljno samo povećavati rezoluciju, već i broj boja koje se mogu prikazati na monitoru. Number of bits that color information is coded presents maximum number of colors that can be shown on monitor. From color number depends picture qualiy. Standards are:

8 - bitna boja (256 boja) - Pseudo Color
16 - bitna boja (65650 boja) - High Color
24 - bitna boja (16,7 miliona boja) - True Color
32 - bitna boja (4,3 milijarde boja) - Pure Color

Introduction

2006-09-10T17:13:00.000+02:00

In next posts I will write about graphics cards.

Graphics card is computer component rensposible for creating image shown on monitor screen. On first text-based computers that was simple, and microprocessor could do most of work and even then there was chip that generated output signal for screen.

However, with development of graphics operating systems, amount of informations needed to process for screen increased enormaly. Increasing got to that level that it was inpractical for main processor to process. Solution was to unload mainprocessor from all screen presentation activities, by making purpuse-made, graphics card.

While requirements of multimedia and 3D graphics were growing, importance of graphics card became bigger and bigger. It reached level of high efficiant processor units, and we can reffer to it with high specialized co-processor. Today, some graphcs cards have more transistors than CPU (Central Processing Unit), and they process far more complicated operations, and acctualy presents so called computer inside computer.

At the end of last century, production of graphics card chips reached levels unbeatable by any other PC and technology area. Leading companies are ATI, nVidia, Matrox, S3, 3Dfx (after some time nVidia bought this one). Lifetime of these graphics chips should be 6 months, which is the least comparing with any other area of PC technology. One of consequences of this is survival and strengthening ony few of main manufactures of graphics cards.

OpenGL tutorials

2006-09-10T13:19:00.001+02:00

Best and biggest resource for finding out OpenGL details are from:

wikipedia
Nehe OpenGL
Google Books

Fahrenheit

2006-09-09T15:32:00.000+02:00

Fahrenheit was or should have been project that would make uniqe multiplatform API, made by Microsoft, SGI and HP, with plan that would unite OpenGL and Direct3D. Orginal project is now totaly abandoned and Microsoft and SGI quit of trying to work together.

Before end of 1997. Microsoft and SGI agreed for delivery of their solution and their parts in project. SGI should deliver soulutions for Fahrenheit Scene Graph and solutions used in CAD applications for Fahrenheit Large Model, while Microsoft should deliver low-level solutions for Direct3D replacement. Project was presented at SIGGRAPH in 1998 and shoud be completed in 1-2 years period. Fahrenheit stopped to be primary in development in SGI because their mainframe computers MIPs were loosing on performanses because of global development of PCs. Until 1999 SGI realized that Microsoft doesn't attent to fulfil their part of deal. Without low-level solutions, Fahrenheit couldn't exist and their project stopped. SGI was found itself in worse position and couldn't watch how Microsoft is ruing their buissnes plans so SGI gave up part of ownership and gave it to Microsoft. Everything left of Fahrenheit is XSG which was Scene Graph and pubblished by Microsoft with note that it wouldn't be supported.

OpenGL vs. Direct3D

2006-09-09T15:14:00.003+02:00

Direct3D is API (Application Programming Interface) developed by Microsoft and only competition to OpenGL. Direct3D is primary made for single operating system, and the one developed by Microsoft, and some other Microsoft entertaiment consoles like Xbox. Attempts for switching Direct3D to other platforms with specific emulators weren't successful and that can produce some violation of copyrights so trying to do so is quited.

Microsoft started to develop Direct3D for Apple PowerPC computers, but that project started pretty badly, so it was abandoned. So Apple has been without graphics support for a while while it hasn't standardize OpenGL.

On the other hand OpenGL is implemented in all modern operating systems, like Microsoft Windows, Unix-based and Unix-like operating systems, Linux, Mac OS X, and entertaiment consoles like Nitendo and Sony (Playstation 3).

Smaller manufactures of graphics cards like Intel Extreme Graphics Line, have better support for Direct3D then OpenGL but 2 biggest ones, ATI and Nvidia, have very good equivalent support for both, OpenGL and Direct3D for all platforms (Windows and non-Windows) and they bind that they will support OpenGL standard in future.

Until 1998 Direct3D considered itself as unsabile API, but since version Direct3D version 5 situation has changed and Direct3D got significant improvements. Direct3D and OpenGL when executing their code, they do it with 2 different logics. Direct3D is closer to hardware unlike OpenGL. When we are starting minimized Direct3D application our computer again does loading of all components (textures, model geometry, etc...) unlike OpenGL where is almost everything allready loaded so period of waiting time to maximize application is much smaller.

OpenGL history

2006-09-08T17:05:00.001+02:00

Today we can see that CG is used for playing games, graphic presentation of science works, for special effects in movies and other different places. 15 years ago, using of CG was very rare and only in professional purposes, and those who created had to develop hardware access code by them selves, so SGI (Silicon Graphics Inc.) decided to build API (Application Programing Interface) which would standardize hardware access code, and resposibility for developing it, swich to graphics card manufactures nvidia, ati, etc...

Because, back then, there were lots of manufactures, making it possible for anyone to have their access interface, every user in different programming language could make simple graphic program without complications about hardware access. In 1992 SGI led to formation of OpenGL ARB (Architectural Review Board), which was consisted of groups of companies that will in future standardize OpenGL for different software and hardware platforms.

OpenGL eveluated from earlier and very similiar SGI 3D interface, IrisGL.
IrisGL had hardware restriction, programs made in IrisGL could work only on specific hardware platforms. OpenGL bypassed that problem with software way, and made it possible for advance graphics to be used in non proffesional systems.

When in 1995 Microsoft published its Direct3D, Microsoft, SGI, and HP (Hewlett-Packard) decided to run Fahrenheit project which sould make API that would unite OpenGL and D3D good characteristics so there would be no competition in that area, and that uniqe API would exist. Because lots of tensions this project was abandoned and SGI and Microsoft quit working together.

Introduction to OpenGL

2006-09-07T10:34:00.001+02:00

okey, next few posts will be about opengl. What is it, how it works, basic commands, etc..

OpenGL (Open Graphics Language - Ogl) is multiplatform union of functions and procedures for making real time 3D graphics on computer monitor, which is drawn in 3 dimensions (3D), including 2D graphics in real time. It is popular because it is used in big number of games for drawing graphics, and its competition is Direct3D (also reffered as D3D) by Microsoft, which is one platform, made only for Microsoft Windows. OpenGL is used in: 3D applications, and scientific applications for visualization. It is consisted with about 250 commands that enables drawing of complicated 3D scenes.

History of Computer Graphics

2006-04-13T19:38:00.005+02:00

Here I am going to present history of computer graphics and little about computers it selves. For some picture will be submitted so will explanation.

1947
Shockley, Bardeen and Brattain of Bell Labs invent transistors ("transfer resistance")

From this everything started. Transistors have replaced vacum tubes, and thanks to their small sizes making of chips of big number of transistors was succesfuly done

1963
Mouse invented by Doug Englebart of SRI

It is enough to say that we can't imagine todays work with computers without mouse...

DAC-1, first commercial CAD system, developed in 1959 by IBM for General Motors is shown at JCC

CAD(Computer Aided Design) programs - are used in big companies and this one of its first versions developed by IBM especial for GM company. One of most popular ones in todays world is CATIA(IBM).

1965
CADAM developed at Lockheed; CADD developed at McDonnell Douglas - This is one more version of CAD programs. Now we can see how computer graphics industry had slow begining.

1967
Adage real time 3D line drawing system - yet another program that made Adage company which was created in 1965

1969
UNIX developed by Thompson and Ritchie at Bell Labs (in PDP-7 assembly code) - not directly in connection with CG, but this was one of biggest operating systems in the past, and all next operating systems are based on this one(BSD->MacOS, GNU/Linux, Solaris, etc..) or used expiriences from that OS (Windows, OS/2, etc..)

First use of CGI for commercials - MAGI for IBM - yet another step into making CG industry more expansible.

Graphical User Interface (GUI) developed by Xerox (Alan Kay) - I think this is most important for computers at all... The ideas for this GUI are made back in WWII and some of those ideas were redesigned and they get GUI. After, Apple take that idea, after M$ has, and we have it like today. You can notice that it hasn't changed a lot. LINK

SIGGRAPH formed (began as special interest committee in 1967 by Sam Matsa and Andy vanDam) - we all know what SIGGRAPH is today --- biggest CG (3D, producers, artists, etc.. ) event in the world.

1972
Emmy awarded to Lee Harrison for SCANIMATE (star wars) - here we can see another application of 3D
C language developed by Ritchie - Most programs at all are written in C Programming language, so I don't want to make this an exeption.

1973
Barnhill and Riesenfeld introduce the name "Computer-Aided Geometric Design" (CAGD) - Yet another Computer Aided Design program developed, but this time it is for geometry.

1974
z-buffer developed by Ed Catmull (University of Utah) - z buffer is very important in todays games, and real time 3D rendering (3D programs). In programing rendering is done is buffer, and when it is done, action of swaping buffers is called. With this way, apearing of flickering effect is avoid.

1975
Phong shading - Bui-Toung Phong (University of Utah) - I bet that few milions of times a day this type of shading is used in 3D scenes. Enough said.
Bill Gates starts Microsoft - Have you heared about Microsoft ?
Anima animation system developed at CGRG at Ohio State (Csuri) - This and similiar programs maybe aren't big cas today, but we have to respect them because thanks to them and expiriences with those programs, we have todays ones.

1976
Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak start Apple computer.

1977
Computer Graphics World begins publication (started by Joel and N'omi Orr as Computer Graphics Newsletter)
Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences introduces Visual Effects category for Oscars - yet another significant point in our history.

1978
Lance Williams curved shadows paper. - Shadow maps are very used today, and they make work a lot easier. LINK
First CGI film title - Superman (R. Greenberg)
Bump mapping introduced (Blinn)

Bump map changes look of textured object from smooth to more bumped. It is very useful and usable option.

1980
Turner Whitted of Bell Labs publishes ray tracing paper - ray tracing is known as one of better techniques for rendering

1982
Tron released - Legendary movie named TRON released. It used a lot of CG.
Sun Microsystems founded (sun := Stanford University Network)
Skeleton Animation System (SAS) developed at CGRG at Ohio State (Dave Zeltzer)
Adobe founded by John Warnock

1983
Particle systems (Reeves - Lucasfilm) - Today particle systems are used for creating simulation such as: rain, snow, liquid, or custom particles.
Non-Uniform Rational B-Splines (NURBS) introduced by Tiller - One of more advanced tools for modeling and shaping objects.
Alias founded in Toronto by Stephen Bingham, Nigel McGrath, Susan McKenna and David Springer - Alias, until recently was one of bigest companies for producing of CG software

1984
Wavefront Technologies is the first commercially available 3D software package with distributed ray tracing
Radiosity born - yet another more advanced rendering technique.

1985
PODA creature animation system developed by Girard and Maciejewski at Ohio State - by now we can se that CG industry expanded a lot.
1986
Softimage founded by Daniel Langlois in Montreal - One of todays best CG programs that has Compositing program integrated.
mental images founded in Berlin - Company that made best rendering software (mental ray) was founded in 1985.

1987 GIF format (CompuServe), JPEG format (Joint Photographic Experts Group) - I'm sure that all computer users are using jpg and almost all gif, pictures.
Side Effects Software established - company that owns one of todays bigest 3D program.

1989
Adobe Photoshop - One of best programs for editing pictures.
mental ray renderer released (integrated with Wavefront (1992), Softimage (1993), Maya (2002)) - awarded AMPAS Technical Achievment Award in 2002 - I mentioned mental ray above.
PIXAR starts marketing RenderMan - Renderman is special rendering software developed inside pixar for pixar needs. It is the only one that could compare with mental ray until recently.

1990
3D Studio (AutoDesk) - More known as 3D Studio Max, as it is called today. Latest version is 8 and it is one of most popular 3D programs.

1991
ILM produces Terminator 2 - we all have seen movie Terminator 2.

1992
OpenGL (SGI) released - I can freely say that this was special year. OpenGL, today is used in every 3D program for real time rendering of scenes. It is used in big number of games also.

1994
Microsoft acquires Softimage - announces Windows 95

1995
Wavefront and Alias merge

1997
Bryce 3D - Program that I worked with for 2 years. Great for landscape design.

1998
Alias Maya released - Maya is program that has been used for creating big number of games, movies, projects, etc... It is very popular and has got lot of abilities.
Google launched - http://www.google.com

Avid purchases SoftImage from Microsoft

1999
Side Effects Houdini ported to Linux - small number of programs (especialy 3D programs) have been ported to GNU/Linux or other systems, but Houdini has even been ported to Solaris.

2000
Maya ported to Macintosh - at that time Macintosh were strong machines and using that hardware with this software was needed like food.

2001
Side Effects Houdini ported to Sun

2003
Alias/Wavefront becomes Alias

2005
Autodesk agrees to purchase Alias for $182M.

2006
Intel Mac released, MacOS ported to PC and Windows ported to Macs.
Softimage|FACE ROBOT released
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There has been a lot of 3D events lately, but I have taken the most imported ones, because, time of 5 years (2000-2006) is not relatively long period.

With this post I didn't want just to give you new informations what happened few or 10's of years ago, but I wanted to take your attention and point to past a little bit, because we must respect that. People in that period have tried to make better programs, technology and because of that we have what we have today

3D Terms

2006-04-12T11:45:00.002+02:00

Vertex - is, simply said, point in 3D world. Its position is determined by 3 axis(x,y,z). Points are connected with other polygons with edges. Minimaly 3 points with 3 edges can create single polygon. One vertex (point) can be "connected" with n edges. Point doesn't have volumic value, meaning that if there is single point or 2 points connected with one edge, they won't be rendered with render software. Acctualy they will be, but they are very thin so you won't see them.

Edges are connections of two vertexes. They are also one of n sides of polygons and they determin final look of polygon with render software in render window or rendered picture.

Polygon - is flat surface made from minimaly 3 points and 3 edges. Usualy that number is 4, but it is unlimited. Every polygon has two faces. Front and back face. Faces are important for light reflection. Face determination is done with vertex normals. If camera is looking at back face of polygon. Rendered from that camera, polygon will be almost black, acctualy we won't get wanted results. If we are rendering with camera looking front face we will get wanted results(textures, etc..)

Vertex normals - are short imaginary lines that show orientation of point. If we have 4 point polygon and 2 points are oriented to one way we would have see well rendered half of polygon in render view.

Object is set of different connected polygons, vertexes, edges that they create recognizable object to a user. Object can be set of connected components mentioned abouve or can be group of few object or meshes. Object are also used for easier manipulating of position of vertexes.

Meshes are similiar to objects but they're not just any group of vertexes, polygons.. They are uniqe group of them. Some meshes are also called objects. Thats what I call, term confusion. Lets take example of 2 cases. If we have group of automobile parts, each one positioned at its place, than every one of them is a mesh because it isn't group of more meshes. If we group these meshes we would get object. If we make uniqe object from these meshes we would get mesh object of a car. Unlike object meshes are uniqe group of only polygons (vertex, edges, not curves or rounded surfaces)

On this picture:

- Polygon is red color
- Edges are yellow color
- Points(Vertexes) are blue
- Normals are blue lines with begining at points
- Two boxes are objects(or meshes) If we apply Unite Boolean operation on those two we would get mesh object.

NURBS are Non-Uniformal Rational B-Splines) way of defining curves and surfaces with CVs (Control Vertexes) and vectors-tangents. NURBS objects and surfaces dont have polygons, so they have ideal rounting.

Selected objects are B-Spline, NURBS curves, and

between them is NURBS object created by lofting

Loft is process when creating object, surface object from two NURBS curves.

Boolean operations are consisted of 3 operations. Those operations from two object make one. One of operations is uniting, which does uniting 2 objects into new one. Second operations creates new object which is intercepting area of those two objects. 3rd one does cutting first object with second one and creates new object.

Alpha channel -> most of pictures have 3 channels (Red, Green and Blue) but with alpha channel we can show transparency, which is very useful in compositing. Picture that presents alpha channel is black&white.

Antialising - is softing of alised edges that are showed in rendered picture by mixing neighbouring pixels. Most of programs have this ability but there are some programs specialized for that job.

Bounding box - it is 3D object of box with 6 polygons, but it is acctualy presentation of some more complex 3D object. You see a box, in 3D scene but in render, other object will be rendered. These are used when creating complex scenes if your computer can't support scene because of hardware weakness.

Bump was developed in 1978, and it is texture applied on object which gives user, that surface on which bump is applied, is not flat surface, but it has bumping where bump map is white colored. Bump map is black-white picture (NOTE!: not black&white version of texture). Some programs have ability to generate bump map.

Clipping -> This is procedure that does reducing amount of data which are calculate for rendering because for datas out of camera range calculation is not done.

Culling -> Ability that for hidden materials and objects that are in camera range but behind some other object, calculation is not done.

Morphing -> Changing shape of object during animation (shape animation)

OpenGL -> SGI developed GAPI (Graphic Application Programming Interface), that is multiplatform (MacOS, SolarisOS, LinuxOSes, WindowsOS, IRIX). It is advanced version of IRIX GL. It is used in big number of games, and in every more popular 3D program.

Particle -> ojects that are used for simulating rain, steam, water (aldo lately are used special fluid simulators), custom particles, snow, etc...

Refraction -> Inverse of reflection.

Viewport -> window with look to 3D scene (or just scene for compositing programs, video programs, etc..), where you can do translation, scaling, rotating, etc... of polygons, vertexes, edges, objects, meshes, etc....

Computer Graphics - part 1

2006-04-11T09:42:00.000+02:00

Sorry for not being posting for a while....

Basics of 3D
------------
Here we are going to present basics of 3D and 3D world theory. We are living in 3 dimensional world. Every position in our world can be presented with 3 coordinates offseted from some imaginary point called coordinate begining. We have it in every 3D program, and that is place where every object is positioned when they are created.

There are 2 standards of coordinate axes.
One of them is where Z axis is representing height and in other one Y axis representing height.
Some people say that first one is europen and second american standard. Now, I don't know is it supported by official, but I think people should look at that this way:
For architects (who are drawing picture from above) they should draw it in X and Y axis and when they want to get height, they extrude it by Z axis, but for usual users of 3D programs they should deal with space where Y is axis for height.

All in all, that doesn't matter, what matter is that you should chose what best fits for you. Newer 3D programs have ability you to chose which standard...

Now we will introduce with some basic terms in 3D world....

Installing from source code

2006-04-04T11:00:00.000+02:00

Here we are going to install GAIM chat program from its source code. Enough talk, get to work :D.

First download its source code from: http://gaim.sourceforge.net/

Open Konsole and in first shell position your self to folder where you have downloaded gaim and untar gaim tar file with command that we learned in previous lesson: tar -xf filename.tar.gz

dir so you can see what is inside download folder, and you will se gaim folder (it will not be called gaim but gaim-1.5.0)

cd position yourself in it and dir to see what is in there...

Type ./configure and shell will list something and do some checking.
At the end you will see what packages will and be and will not be installed.

We'll take example of tcl package. We will find and download it, then install it and then implement it with installation of gaim. This is just for an example but you will use this a lot, special for configuring apache+php+mysql.

type: ./configure --help
and you will get list of commands that can be written in extension of ./configure command.

REMEMBER: every command has --help extension which helps you using that command.

With that way we'll list to see our possibilities. Find where it says something about tcl. It is something like this: --with-tclconfig=DIR

Find and download, and untar, and position yourself to tcl folder.
Tcl can be found at: http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/stable/general/tcl.html

Install it with next way (you have it also on link that is above):
copy/paste in shell this:

export VERSION=8.4.11 &&
export V=`echo $VERSION | cut -d "." -f 1,2` &&
export DIR=$PWD &&
cd unix &&
./configure --prefix=/usr --enable-threads &&
make &&
sed -i "s:${DIR}/unix:/usr/lib:" tclConfig.sh &&
sed -i "s:${DIR}:/usr/include/tcl${V}:" tclConfig.sh &&
sed -i "s,^TCL_LIB_FILE='libtcl${V}..TCL_DBGX..so',TCL_LIB_FILE=\"libtcl${V}\$\{TCL_DBGX\}.so\"," tclConfig.sh

Then login as root (su):
and copy/paste this in shell:

make install &&
install -v -d /usr/include/tcl${V}/unix &&
install -v -m644 *.h /usr/include/tcl${V}/unix/ &&
install -v -d /usr/include/tcl${V}/generic &&
install -v -c -m644 ../generic/*.h /usr/include/tcl${V}/generic/ &&
rm -v -f /usr/include/tcl${V}/generic/{tcl,tclDecls,tclPlatDecls}.h &&
ln -v -nsf ../../include/tcl${V} /usr/lib/tcl${V}/include &&
ln -v -sf libtcl${V}.so /usr/lib/libtcl.so &&
ln -v -sf tclsh${V} /usr/bin/tclsh

then do the same with this:

unset VERSION &&
unset V &&
unset DIR

Tcl libraries will be installed in: /usr/lib
We will check it are they there, and yes they are:

Now we are going to add parametar: --with-tclconfig=/usr/lib in ./configure command

and here you can see that Tcl is supported.
To install program I also recomend you to use parametar: --prefix=/usr/local/gaim because that is location where shell will install gaim.

so whole ./configurate command would look like this: ./configure --prefix=/usr/local/gaim --with-tclconfig=/usr/lib

To install it login as root (su), and type: make && make install
make does compiling
make install does installing

You can also use combination and type:
./configure --prefix=/usr/local/gaim --with-tclconfig=/usr/lib && make && make install

To run gaim, position yourself to its folder, and type: ./gaim

Usualy, programs are run by this way through shell: ./NameOfProgram

Konsole Shell part 1

2006-04-02T19:39:00.001+02:00

Here I'll present from basic to more advanced shell commands.

Above anything, run shell.

Tip 1: When you start shell than you can see that background is white and color of letters is black. That isn't pleasent for eyes. So go to the Konsole toolbar: Settings -> Schema and chose some. Than do it again if you don't like it until you find one that fits for you.

Tip 2: Press CTRL+SHIFT+F to view shell in full screen mode

Tip 3: If you have more than one shells (tabs) opened in your console (you can open it at right from where says: "Shell" -on the bottom of Konsole window) you can navigate between them with CTRL + Arrow Left or Right

Tip 4: If you have lot of text written in shell than to scroll, beside pgup and pgdown and slider, you can do it with CTRL+Arrow UP or Arrow Down

We will start with making two new folders. There are two ways to create new folder through shell. It is same as in Microsoft Windows.

MKDIR name-of-directory or
MD name-of-directory

type command for listing directories in your current directory: dir
than you will get list of all directories in your current (home) directory. Between others these two should be there.

Now create two files in that folder from your linux explorer such as Konqueror, just position yourself to folder and do Right Click -> Create New -> Text file...

Now change directory with command: cd name-of-directory
and type dir to make sure everything is there...
To get back to previous folder use command: ..

Next command is move, command, or cut/paste operation that you usual do. Syntax is: mv from/what to-where

You can see it clearly on the picture. Command in translation says: move from folder test1 file test1 to folder test2

Next few lines of commands in bellow picture is experimenting with explained commands. The only one new thing is using dir command in one different way.
Type: dir test1 test2 if you have those two folders of cource, and command will display all files from both folders.

Next trick is making of symbolic links.
Symbolic link is something like shorcut, but is is link to some file, in some folder on your filesystem.
Using symbolic link has much advantages:
1. User doesn't have to deal with complex names for filenames
2. Programs treat Symbolic links as real program files meaning that you can you can apply symbolic link to any file, shell script, execution file, system file, text file, eaven folders, name it...

it is created by ln command with parametar -s
Syntax is: ln -s full-path-of-file name-of-link

Translation of command would be: Make symbolic link of file /home/mayatitan/test1/test1 and put it in folder test2 and name symbolic link test1

note that when dir-ing files you can recognize syblic links because they are in this-like form:
#: name-of-file -> where it is linked
and it is usualy colored with specific color

now when we have finished with working with our files we'll delete them.
note: you can't delete folders that contain files

to delete files position yourself to folder (cd) and use: rm file-name1 file-name2
which means that you can delete two or more files at once
go to another folder and do the same thing

get back to home and delete folders test1 and test2 with command: rd test1 test2 it is synonim for remove directory

Beyond lesson 3 notes
--------------------------
1: You can use ls command in replace for dir. Just type in shell ls

2: If you want to install some rpm file through shell then position yourself to folder where is rpm file and login as su (super user, command : su) and type in:
#: rpm -i filename.rpm
(without #:) (rpm is command, -i is parametar that tells command to do instalation of filename.rpm file)

So if you have problems installing some rpm file you can do it this way and you will see errors that you should and maybe will fix

3: extracting archive from .tar.gz file is done with this command:
#: tar -xf filename.tar.gz

Novell Suse Linux part 2 - Nvidia Graphic Drivers

2006-03-30T19:45:00.002+02:00

okey, now we will explain how to install Nvidia graphic drivers. I will not explain it for ATI graphic cards because I don't have one, so...

Installing Nvidia drivers can be easily done in 3 steps:
- downloading
- switching to init 3 mode in console
- installing & returning to system & restarting the computer

First start by downloading drivers from nvidia.com site for your computer. You can download it in 2 easy ways, we'll explain them both. First is to download directly from net using your Internet Browser/Download Menager such as Opera
Here are direct links:
- Nvidia graphic drivers for 32-bit machines
- Nvidia graphic drivers for 64-bit Intel machines
- Nvidia graphic drivers for 64-bit AMD machines

Other way to download is to use wget in shell. Now we are going to run shell (konsole), with START->Run Application... & enter konsole & press ENTER

when you open console enter "su" (superuser mode) and press ENTER, and type password of root.
Enter: init 3 (to switch to init 3 mode - screen will turn off and turn on, and switch to text graphics interface, where you will logon as root)


username: root
password:

then locate your self into folder where is your installation package with "cd" (change directory) command:


linux:~ # cd /
linux:/ # cd home
linux:/home # cd mujko
linux:/home/mujko # sh NVIDIA-Linux-x86-1.0-8178-pkg1.run

final line -> when you are at your folder where package is(/home/username) then enter: sh NameOfThePackage.run

With arrows (left and right) navigate to "Accept" button and press enter. Then installation will start and you just sit back and relax, when it is finished, it will return back to text graphic user interface, where you will login as root, and enter: "init 5" To switch back to full graphic user interface

When you have done that, open console, again and login as root, and copy/paste or rewrite these two rows:


cp /etc/X11/xorg.conf /etc/X11/xorg.conf.backup
sed -i 's/"nv"/"nvidia"/g' /etc/X11/xorg.conf

first line creates backup of xorg configuration file
second line changes xorg.conf file using sed interactive text editor

Restart your computer and you will be able to play games and use other programs that require 3D acceleration.

You can also go into SAX2 program where you can configure position of screen, resolution and stuff. You can find it at: Start -> System -> Configuration -> Sax2

thats for today, tomorrow i will explain basic console(shell) commands...

for issue of using KDE or GNOME i will not explain (you should play with it to figure stuff out, it is not difficult)

Novell SuSe 9.3 GNU/Linux part 1

2006-03-27T22:56:00.000+02:00

For this subject I will explain how to install Suse linux 9.3. Reason I have chosed this one is that I have most expirience with it. After explaining installation process, I will explain shell and some other elements & stuff...
Latest version is Suse 10, that has some impruvments, and some packages are added, but basicly it is almost same as 9.3.

What does it mean GNU/Linux ?
Most of us say: "I have linux.", "I have installed Linux".. etc... What we reffer to is GNU/Linux. Here is the story:
GNU project was founded 1984 which had purpose to create Unix-like Operating System, that is free for anybody and everything. Richard Stallman is founder of that organisation. From that year till end of 80s, they have developed lot of programs, and GNU C compiler, but thay had problems with making kernel. In 1991 Linus Torvalds developed Unix-like kernel and GNU project used that kernel for making OS. It was called GNU/Linux. Whole story can be read at: HERE

You can find linux from your frineds or LUG (Linux User Group) of your country or download from different ftp servers. List of ftp servers can be found: HERE

Note: If you want to have DualBoot machine (to be able to run Linux or Windows by choosing from some bootup menu) just install Windows before Linux.

Suse linux is currently held by Novell, Novell co. has big plans for Suse Linux. There are 2 versions of Suse Linux. Free one and Suse Enterprise server. Second ones are used in servers for running big servers, where Red Hat Linux is alternative. So is Microsoft Windows Server 2000 and 2003 but Linux has better performance.

Lets start:
1. Set BIOS bootup option so CD is first bootup device (like for installing windows)
2. Insert CD1 of your Suse CD collection(or DVD) while computer is being restarted
3. When you get to the bootup screen few options will be shown where you can choose. We'll choose "Installation" type.

4. We'll wait until kernel loads and let linux do his stuff, sit back and relax, until you see mouse pointer and Licence agreement.
Window that will open is called YaST (as it shown at left top corner of your screen). It means: Yet Another Setup Tool, and it is like Control Panel in Windows, from where you can setup whole system.

5. Read Licence agreement if you want to and accept it if you want to continiue
6. After accepting Licence agreement, YaST will ask you about your language. Else not English choose it (English is default), and click "Accept".

7. Now, wait for few moments and if YaST prompt for some error, like is this one for some HDD for using RAID configuration. Just ignore it by clicking OK

8. After that you might get asked about type of installation. In this case, I had Linux already installed, so it asked me about type of installation. As you can see, other options speek for them selves.

9. After that, you will get overview to all install configuration. We will hold on most important ones

1st is System information. We dont need to do anything there, except reading our hardware info.
2nd is Mode: New Installation (we have just chosen that)
3rd is Keyboard layout
and etc...

10. Click to Keyboard layout and choose your Keyboard layout, then click Accept

11. Next one is Partitioning (we'll skip mouse). Partitioning is one of most important parts of installation. Because, if you do it wrong, lots of datas can be easily deleted. My friend recently has loosed 180 GBs of datas, because he partitioned wrong. So be careful!

Click on Partitioning and you will get something like this:

This is proposal by YaST about your partitoning, but we'll choose option "Base partition setup on this proposal" so we can do custom editing.

That is how it is inside partitioning window. You can see I have lot of partitions :D. I'll presume that you don't have any linux partitions. So, first you have to resize your windows partition.
To do that select specific partition and click "Edit" in bottom part of screen.

In edit tab you will see lots of options.

First there is to chose to format or not to format that partition. If you chose yes than you should select file system. Recomended one is Reiser, but also there are ext2, ext3 and other.

Note: SWAP file system is used for creating partitions that are about twice as your RAM memory.

Right of that is located "Size" that is set by entering number of cylinders. So if you want specific size then you have to enter number of cylinders manaly. Then click OK, and see if size is goot. If it isn't than click edit again and repeat it.

Now we'll create 2 partitions (for linux). If you aren't able to have 2 more partitions 1 can do enough, but 2 are recomended. Those two are: partition for data, and swap partition. On swap partition are located datas when RAM is full.

Now click Create then popup will open, requesting to which HDD to put that partition. When you click OK another popup will ask what type of partition (Primary or Logical) chose Primary. OK.
Then same window as Edit one will open, now chose previously explained options (but leave place for swap in Size part of window). For mounting options set mount point to: /

Note: Linux has one Filesystem, named "/" . In that part are placed some folders (home, usr, dev, opt, media, mount, bin etc.. you can have yours folders if you want). All those folders are placed on HDD(partition) which mount point is "/". If you want /home (similiar as "User's Docunents" in Windows) folder to be on another partition, than at this "Mount point" place you set it to /home. But you'll need it later when you figure this up, more than now.

For now, just leave it as / and press OK.

Now with same procedure create swap partition but in Format options chose Filesystem: SWAP
------------------
now you can close all partition windows with clicking accept or OK and get back to the main menu.
------------------
click on Software, where we will chose what software to install

You will first be asked to chose what Desktop Menagers to linux be installed with. There are lots of them but most popular are GNOME and KDE. It is on o users to chose wich one is best for them. I personaly like GNOME little more than KDE so I chhosed GNOME. KDE is more like Windows, but it is easily to adopt from GNOME to KDE and vice verse.
Note that program (packages) selection is same for KDE or GNOME.

Click on "Detailed Selection" to chose programs. You will get this screen:

First, on left side choose and check "Sipmle webserver with apache2". And you can also choose some other group and in right side check some packages. You can also find and check packages by using pull-down menu located at left top, bellow menu, of screen. You can choose Search, and there you can enter name or part of name of package, then on right side you check specific package. Select some packages if you want to, you also have description on right side. I suggest that you install among others, these packages: openmotif, pkgconfig, openal, tuxracer, blender, ImageMagic, broadcast2000, gtkcam, wxGTK, xmms, bind, bitchx, fonts..
if you are installing suse 10 then try to find and check these: opera, konversation, etc...

Whan you have finished by clicking OK or Accept return to the main menu, and click on "Boot Loader".
There are two types of Boot Loaders: GRUB and LILO. I prefer LILO, it has more options to configurate, and i had some problems with GRUB. Now what we will do is to select first row, and click Edit (bottom of screen). There will be pull-down menu where you can choose LILO or GRUB or some other option, choose LILO. Window will popup asking for instructions. It asks wheather it will convert setup configuration or something else. Just click OK.

On place where it says "Default selection", select it, click edit, and window will open where you will see among others, "Windows". Select row where "Windows" is, and click: SET AS DEFAULT (so Windows is default selection). With OK and Accept return to main menu.

Next is Time Zone, where you select your country.

Now click Accept on main menu. YaST will ask about some acceptances and maybe show some errors, just Accept it and continiue.
Now Suse will install first CD or all if it is DVD.

You can click on another tab to se details about instaling packages.
After 1. CD is finished, system will be restarted and when you boot up from CD and after choose "Boot up from Hard disk" option then YaST will open and ask for 3. and rest of CDs.

Installation procedure is finished. Now comes configuration. After installation proces you should get something like this:

Enter you root password and click next. You will be shown your network configuration, but we will pass through that;
next, YaST will ask us about connecting to internet.. no...
next, "User Authentication Methon", just leave it default and
next, "Add a New User Option", you will enter your name, nick, and password,
next, YaST will save settings, and show welcome screen,
next, "Hardware Configuration", you can choose graphic card, or monitor and select it from list, but it is better to leave it for later. Also, when you enter into screen to setup that, when you chage your setings, and when you pres "Finalize>>" there will be 3 options shown: Test, save, cancel.
When you click on test then another screen will open where you can set position of screen on your monitor. Whan you set it up, save it and return to main of configuration.

After Finishing "Hardware Configuration" and clicking Finish, SuSe will take you to login screen where you can login with your User username and password.

----------------------------------------------------------
I know it is long post, but I wanted to write all details.

MySQL basic commands part 4 | final one

2006-03-25T13:04:00.000+01:00

So here, we'll use different combinations of SELECT command, add new column and delete table and database.

As mentioned after SELECT word, comes names of attribute that we want to list. If want all of them then we put * . If we want more then one, then we separate their names by , sign.
For example:
if you want to list all people's names and surnames then you type: SELECT name, surname FROM person;
Same goes for names and birth dates, or more of those atributes, you just specify them in there...

next part of SELECT command is FROM place. In FROM place of command we are specifing from where to select those atributes. In our case it is from one table, table person. But for cases where we want to select atributes from more tables, then we specify more tables, in this part. Using this command for more tables i will explain in next series of mysql commands.

Next part of SELECT is WHERE. In where part we are putting condition that will affect rows. It is same as we used it with UPDATE command...

so if we want to select (show) name and surnames of people named edin we would use next command:
SELECT name, surname FROM person WHERE name='edin';
exmpl:

Also we could use some other functions named: COUNT, MIN, MAX, SUM, AVG in SELECT part of statement.
Here is example of one of them:
SELECT COUNT(*) FROM person WHERE name='edin';

No matter what you write inside () of COUNT, this select command will bring you back one column with number of rows where name is edin from table person.

Addin new column named age.
Lets sey we want to add new column where will be number that represents age of specific person. Adding column is in SELECT part of command, but mysql gives us ability to do calculations right in there. So it will be:

SELECT name, surname, height, weight, birth, YEAR(CURDATE())-YEAR(birth) AS age FROM person;

now you can do playing with SELECT command, for example in place of COUNT you can put MIN(birth) so you can see oldest date in birth column, or min(birth) for youngest.

Deleting datas: DELETE FROM person;
All datas will be deleted

Deleting table: DROP TABLE person;
Table person will be deleted weather it has or hasn't got datas

Deleting database: DROP DATABASE students;
Database will be deleted weather it has or hasn't got datas(tables with datas) in it

We have finished very basics of MySQL commands. These can be used within php, when writing it, or C, C++, C#, Pascal(Delphi) or almost every other programing language.

Now that you have learned basics, you can move to more advanced tutorials, that can be found all over internet (google.com, mysql.org) or inside mysql documentation that comes with mysql installation.

If you don't need right now that advanced knowlage it is good that you have read this, because you now know basic of mysql, and when we cover rest of mysql than you will fully know it;)

other parts about MySQL:
MySQL basic commands part 1
MySQL basic commands part 2
MySQL basic commands part 3

MySQL basic commands part 3

2006-03-23T21:54:00.002+01:00

SELECT command is one of most common commands in MySQL. Its syntax is little more complex, but here we'll as all, present basic things...

SELECT atributes FROM table_or_tables WHERE condition;

More advanced purpose of this command we'll explain later in this post. For now, if there is some data that needs to be changed then we will use command:


UPDATE table SET atribute="value" WHERE condition;

For example lets try to correct value of height to 185 at person: edin bukva
in this example condition will consists of two parts because there are two people named edin. So for condidition we can use:
name='edin' and surname='bukva'
or just: surname='bukva' because there is only one man with bukva surname

UPDATE person SET height='185' WHERE name='edin' and surname='bukva';

In condition part we used "and" operator. It is normal to use these operators (and, or, etc...)

If we wanted to add new row (record) we would use this command:

INSERT INTO table VALUES('1st atribute value','2nd',...);

so on our example it would be like this:

INSERT INTO person VALUES('name1','surname1','180','78',NULL);

NULL for value means that there will be no value for that field.

You can see the procedure at whole image:

On pictures you can see that i have used SELECT * FROM person; command to list, so i could see what i have got.
-----------------------------
rest of basic stuff in part 4, until then...

other parts about MySQL:
MySQL basic commands part 1
MySQL basic commands part 2
MySQL basic commands part 4

MySQL basic commands part 2

2006-03-21T20:10:00.002+01:00

first, srry fot not posting for a few days, i have had few personal problems...
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------

note: USE database command is one of commands that doesn't need ; sign for marking end of command.

-----

Now when we have selected specific database with command USE, we now that there is no tables in it. You should know that data in databases like MySQL are stored in tables, where every attribute has its data type.

We'll create table, with command that is logical: CREATE name_of_table ()
Inside () we are putting attributed and defining its data types.
Here we will present few data types, through our example, but if you want to see all of them and their use, check MySQL specification reference.
For our students table we will put in there theirs: name, surname, height, weight, birth.
For name, surname we will use varchar() type of data. In () we are putting max number of characters that name or surname can have.
For height and weight we will use float (decimal) number type
For birth we will use date type of data where type of date is: YYYY-MM-DD by default.

In this table setting of primary keys is not covered because, here I'm tring to explain very basics. Primary key and relations will be covered after this and few more topics.

So here is our command:
CREATE TABLE person (name varchar(15), surname varchar(20), height float, weight float, birth date);
To see weather is everything ok about data types we'll use this command:
-> DESCRIBE name_of_table; or DESC name_of_table;

Now, we need to fill that table. We'll use technique of importing .txt file into our table. For that we need to create .txt file 'C:\file.txt' where will be few lines of our datas. Every row will have data orderd by atributes and separated by 1 TAB.

exemple of 1row of txt file:
name1 (1 TAB separation) surname1 (1 TAB separation) height (1 TAB separation) weight (1 TAB separation) birth (1 TAB separation) \r\n

\r\n is string that is used for end of row, so command can recognise end of 1 row

Syntax of commands that imports .txt file into table is:
LOAD DATA LOCAL INFILE 'C:/path_to_file' INTO TABLE name_of_table LINES TERMINATED BY '\r\n';

note: when putting path of file use sign / for separating between folders or drives, not \ as it is common in Windows Explorer

After this we'll check to make sure that all datas are correctly imported.

SELECT * FROM name_of_table;

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new post very soon

other parts about MySQL:
MySQL basic commands part 1
MySQL basic commands part 3
MySQL basic commands part 4