Tech Soft 3D this week announced their 2021 HOOPS software development toolkits (SDKs), including increased BIM support and beta support for the new Apple M1 (Apple Silicon) chip in next-generation Mac computers.
HOOPS Exchange 2021
New in HOOPS Exchange 2021 is support for 3MF and other new formats aimed at better Building Information Modeling (BIM) support for the AEC industry. Tech Soft 3D says the company has placed an emphasis on this version such that both native CAD and standard formats when they are updated can be pushed and supported for development partners more quickly.
3MF stands for “3D modeling format” and is a format defined by an industry consortium; the format enables applications to send 3D models to full-color 3D printers and is different from the old STL format by its ability to hold more than one object in the scene, with advanced materials, colors, and texture information. 3MF format is accelerating within the additive manufacturing industry and its new support will benefit many.
Exchange 2021 now supports the evolving 3MF file format which supports full-color 3D printers.
Another major improvement in HOOPS Exchange 2021 is continued BIM support, with both DWG, IFC, and Autodesk Revit readers. There is better meta-data support for Revit files and improvements to IFC classes including IFCSwpetAreaSolids and other classes where entities in BIM models are generated by extruded contours like pipes.
Apple Silicon
Tech Soft 3D is supporting Apple’s transition away from Intel chips to its own ARM-based architecture processors like its new M1 SoC chip. The company is providing a beta build of their toolkits to help developers make the transition. The new platform will be fully supported, it says when the company has adequate hardware available to ensure quality control during testing processes. You can read about other HOOPS Exchange features here.
HOOPS Visualize 2021
The new Visualize (HPS) helps support larger models for BIM workflows and better cross-platform support. The BIM model size improvements deal with the complexity of very large translations relative to their size and specifically two types of conditions. One condition is a large translation that places it far from the origin, and the other condition is models containing geometry which is defined very far from the origin. Both complexities lead to rendering problems due to converting data down to single-precision values for HPS. The problems include triangle z-fighting and jittery camera movement.
Using the new HOOPS Communicator Sprocket you can load models from HOOPS Communicator into native HOOPS Visualize applications using new streaming technologies. This is useful for partners who have built their main applications on Communicator but want to build partner applications on Visualize that consume very large models whilst being connected to a Communicator server.
HOOPS Visualize 2021 has added new measurement operators that do not require the HOOPS Exchange product mentioned above. Previously, measurement operators were limited to just models imported via Exchange, preventing the measurement of many forms of data.
MORE: The ODA Releases Support for Apple Silicon Macs
HOOPS Visualize gains performance and scalability improvements in version 2021. And support for headless and virtual environments via the addition of a software-only version of the OpenGL 2 driver. Again, a beta build of Tech Soft 3D’s toolkits allows for developers to port their applications to Apple Silicon hardware in the next-generation Macs. And to better serve new cross-platform application development, Tech Soft 3D has added support for QT Quick.
Reader Comments
Comments for this story are closed