RepresentationType in version 5.10

Development
1

My current ParaView based software is only now being migrated from version 5.9 to 5.10. That software includes a custom view that is derived from the SpreadSheet view, and some of the custom filters have it as their standard output in the plugin XML specified as follows:

  <Hints>
    <ReaderFactory extensions="con CON"
                   file_description="Constraints (from CON files)" />
    <RepresentationType view="AtgTableView" />
    <PipelineIcon name=":/AthosGeoView/icons/pqAtgTableView.svg" />
  </Hints>

This worked so far: The output of that reader was shown in an “AtgTableView”. Now, after migration to PV 5.10, this is not any more the case.

Is there anything new regarding the way how such a custom view has to be invoked?

2

According to the doc: ParaView: Proxy Hints And Annotations, you may be missing the representation attribute

3

Ok - but then the question would be which should be the attribute value? “grepping” the source code of PV 5.10.1, not one single occurrence of “representation=” does exist…

And in the reference that you are mentioning, the only example of a “RepresentationType” is the following:

  <Hints>
    <RepresentationType view="ComparativeRenderView" type="Surface" port="1"/>
    <RepresentationType view="RenderView" type="Wireframe" />
  </Hints>

What this has is always also a “type”, but it also refers to the RenderView which indeed comes with different types.

One problem might occur from the fact that all the custom views which I can see in examples are “representations” within the “render view”, whereas mine is a view that is derived from the spreadsheet view - which does not look like it is commonly used in this way.

This is how that view is specified in it’s own XML file:

<ServerManagerConfiguration>
  <ProxyGroup name="views">
    <TableViewProxy name="AtgTableView"
                    class="vtkAtgTableView"
                    label="Athos Table View"
                    processes="client|renderserver|dataserver"
                    base_proxygroup="views"
                    base_proxyname="SpreadSheetView"
                    representation_name="SpreadSheetRepresentation">

    </TableViewProxy>
  </ProxyGroup>
</ServerManagerConfiguration>

As I said, this worked perfectly up to PV 5.9! Something must have changed that is either explicit in the concept of these XML specifications, or it is a side effect of another change that affects only those strange people who want to derive views from the SpreadSheetView :wink:

4

I think I caught it: Using the “RepresentationType” hint is completely wrong in my case - and it looks like it already was in PV 5.9! Instead I should use the “View” hint as follows:

      <Hints>
        <ReaderFactory extensions="con CON"
                       file_description="Constraints (from CON files)" />
        <View type="AtgTableView" />
        <PipelineIcon name=":/AthosGeoView/icons/pqAtgTableView.svg" />
      </Hints>

With this my code is actually working - and I will have to check whether it was not actually doing the wrong thing already in the past: The difference between my custom view and the standard SpreadSheetView is only a different (and for my purpose more useful) ordering of the columns.

Even though I found the solution now myself, still thanks for the obvious: Having a look into that online manual! So far I was just trying and looking for examples inside the ParaView code.

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