Page Comparison

Last update: 23 Mar 2021 01 May 2024

This page provides you with some insights about the HOOPS Visualize roadmap. If you are interested in providing input or collaborating on any of the projects below, please contact HOOPS Visualize's Product Manager or Tech Soft 3D support.

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• Fix regressions or high priority issues

• Deliver updated formats to reduce availability delays

Release Schedule

See the HOOPS Target General Availability Dates.

Format Updates Plan

Provisional dates plan – Subject to change

Format Updates Plan

Provisional plan – Subject to change

Additionally, refer to the HOOPS Exchange Roadmap for Format Updates Plan, if applicable.

Short-term projects

Projects planned to be delivered in next release (next 4 months)

• New Animation Manager

  • The goal of the new Animation Manager is to simplify creating, and playing animations for the user, and provide the capabilities needed for industrial animation. Example workflows include technical instruction authoring, digital factory simulations, and BIM 5D simulations.

  • Capabilities will include camera animation (position, orientation, etc), translation, rotation, scale, visibility, opacity and color changes for nodes. It will also include constant (on-off), and linear interpolations.

• IFC Improvements (through Exchange Sprocket)

  • Support of additional classes and information that will help model analysis and querying. This will include both the semantic information and being able to display the relationships graphically.

    • Spatial relationships: Project, Site, Building, Story, Spaces, Walls.

    • New classes: Openings.

    • Optimizations for Pipes and Beams

• Support and display of Mates (through Exchange Sprocket)

  • This project will focus on delivering support of the CATIA V5 mates to help applications in Manufacturing simulation, Robotic, Kinematics Analysis and more generate a kinematics model of the assembly.

  • Mates will be supported both semantically and graphically.

  • Note that the support of Mates for other formats might be considered in future release cycles.

• Physically Based Rendering support on mobile platforms

  • Previously PBR did not work on our mobile platforms. This has been corrected, and the API can now be used on Android and iOS. Please note: Exchange does not yet support GLTF on mobile platforms, so reading and display GLTF files in PBR is still not supported.

• Improved performance of text

  • Models which include many text geometries(such as seen in PP&M models) can see a negative performance hit. This project is designed to allow Visualize to use hardware acceleration on text entities.

• New platform: Support of Apple Silicon platform

  • HOOPS Visualize will be ported to Apple's new ARM64 architecture. This is critical for partners using HOOPS Visualize with toolkits such as Electron, delivering a more native application experience (rather than web based).

  • Beta support was already provided with HOOPS Visualize 2021.

• Android AR Sandbox Improvements

  • The Android sandbox will have its AR Core version updated, and include the ability to approximate the Visualize model lighting to the real world environment.

• Parasolid Sprocket for Android

  As Siemens has now released Parasolid for Android, Visualize will port the existing Parasolid sprocket to Android.

  Partners requests

Mid-term projects

Planned or on-going projects that might be delivered mid-term (in one or two releases) – After 4 months / before 12 months

• VRAM management system: this will enable monitoring the usage of VRAM, allowing to choose storing the data in the system or GPU memory to avoid bottlenecks

• Qt6 Update

• .Net6

• Improvements to the Segment Display list performance

• Linux ARM support

Long-term projects

Longer term projects we are considering

• Volumetric Meshes support

• Improved performance for large modelsand scalability

  Client-side Collision Detection

  • This project will focus on improving frames per second performance and resource management optimization when working with large models, or data sets comprised of many files. Examples include BIM federation workflows and Digital Factory simulations.

• PBR improvements

  • Several improvements are planned for PBR in Visualize. This includes better support for environment mapping, image based lighting, and rendering which more closely matches what is coming in HOOPS Communicator. Finally we will add a mechanism to allow non-PBR models (such as CAD models) to be displayed in a PBR mode, providing higher quality renderings without having to re-author all data in a PBR application.

• HoloLens 2 support

  • Support for HoloLens 2 will be added. This will include being able to render models to the HL2's view, but also provide a small set of example operators for the new user interface.

• Metal driver for MacOS and iOS

  • We are developing a new native Metal driver for use on MacOS and iOS. This is to protect our partners shipping on these platforms in case Apple removes OpenGL support.

• PBR output through Exchange sprocket

  • The Exchange Sprocket will be updated to offer the ability to take a HOOPS Visualize model and export it to GLTF through HOOPS Exchange.

Long-term projects

Longer term projects we are considering

• • The long-term goal is to modernize HOOPS Visualize’s rendering pipeline and incrementally take advantage of modern hardware acceleration.

• Perform Collision Detection analysis in Visualize

  • While HOOPS Exchange licensees can use an integration between Visualize and Exchange to check for collisions, this is not designed for interactivity. This project would aim to have collision detection performed on the client-side without reliance on Exchange.

• Add support for implicit modeling

  • The generative design market is pushing the boundaries of what can be manufactured. However since they do not typically use standard BRep / single body mesh forms HOOPS Visualize cannot display these models efficiently. This project will be to investigate what changes would be required to make it easier for generative design applications to use HOOPS Visualize.

• Investigate adding custom shader support to HOOPS Visualize

  • Currently, Visualize does not support custom shaders. This project would aim to expose the ability to insert your own shaders into Visualize's web viewer.

• Investigate integration with Ceetron Desktop Components and Visualize

  As part of the acquisition of Ceetron, we will investigate migrating their native CAE system to HOOPS Visualize

  Vulkan or DX12 drivers

  • Adding support for new generation graphics APIs will enable Visualize to add new functionality and to also begin refactoring the 3DF GS to take advantage of modern GPU architecture.

• Improved rendering quality

  • Several improvements are planned for PBR in Visualize. This should include better support for environment mapping, image based lighting, and rendering which is similar to the rendering in HOOPS Communicator. Finally we will add a mechanism to allow non-PBR models (such as CAD models) to be displayed in a PBR mode, providing higher quality renderings without having to re-author all data in a PBR application.

  • Visualize will improve our PBR rendering support, including clearcoat and specular materials. This is required to render many glTF models as expected.

• Parasolid Sprocket for Android

  • As Siemens has now released Parasolid for Android, Visualize will port the existing Parasolid sprocket to Android.

• PBR output through Exchange sprocket

  • The Exchange Sprocket will be updated to offer the ability to take a HOOPS Visualize model and export it to GLTF through HOOPS Exchange.