README.md

mathics-threejs-backend

A JavaScript library for rendering Mathics (and eventually Wolfram Language) Graphics3D objects.

This can be used in Mathics front ends like Mathics-Django and Symja to handle 3D graphics. The code may also be useful as a guide for other kinds of Mathics/WL frontends to other kinds of JavaScript graphics engines.

Example:

import drawGraphics3D from '@mathicsorg/mathics-threejs-backend';

drawGraphics3D(document.getElementById('main'), {
  elements: [
    {
      type: 'tube',
      color: [0.2, 0.2, 0.2],
      coords: [
        [null, [0, 0, 0]],
        [null, [1, 0, 0]],
        [null, [1, 1, 0]],
        [null, [1, 1, 1]],
        [null, [1, 0, 1]],
        [null, [0, 0, 1]],
        [null, [0, 1, 1]],
        [null, [0, 1, 0]]
      ],
      radius: 0.1
    },
    {
      type: 'uniformPolyhedron',
      color: [1, 0.5, 0.5],
      coords: [
        [[0, 0, 0]],
        [[2, 2, 2]]
      ],
      edgeForm: { showEdges: false },
      opacity: 0.5, // 50% of opacity
      subType: 'dodecahedron'
    },
		{
      type: 'sphere',
      color: [0.5, 0.5, 1],
      coords: [
        [[0, 0, 0]],
        [[1, 1, 1]],
        [[2, 2, 2]]
      ],
      edgeForm: { showEdges: false },
      opacity: 0.7, // 70% of opacity
      radius: 0.5,
      subType: 'dodecahedron'
    }
  ],
  lighting: [
    {
      type: 'ambient',
      color: [0.5, 0.5, 0.5]
    },
    {
      type: 'directional',
      color: [0.8, 0, 0],
      coords: [null, [2, 0, 2]]
    },
    {
      type: 'directional',
      color: [0, 0.8, 0],
      coords: [null, [2, 2, 2]]
    },
    {
      type: 'directional',
      color: [0, 0, 0.8],
      coords: [null, [0, 2, 2]]
    }
  ],
  viewpoint: [2, -4, 4]
});

Lots of other examples can be found in the tests folder of this repository and in the documentation.

Displaying Examples

Install an HTTP server and run it:

$ # Only install the necessary dependencies. Do this only one time.
$ npm install @mathicsorg/mathics-threejs-backend --production
...
added 57 packages, and audited 58 packages in 1s
...
found 0 vulnerabilities

The above only needs to be done once to set up an HTTP server to use. If you already have an HTTP server running that is also able to browse local files in this repository, then you probably don't need to do this.

Otherwise, start the HTTP server that was just installed:

$ npm start  # Do this once per session
...
Server running at http://localhost:8080/
See our gallery in http://localhost:8080/tests/

Hit CTRL-C to stop the server

Finally, look at a file that you want to see rendered, e.g. http://127.0.0.1:8080/tests/cone.html

For installing the development version from GitHub, see the documentation.

Documentation and examples

You can see the documentation and more live examples here.