SimplePointsReader
VTKExamples/Cxx/IO/SimplePointsReader
Description¶
A file of XYZ coordinates is a very easy format that can be used for simple storage from many applications. This example demonstrates how to read this type of file into a polydata object. An example file of three points would look like this:
0.0 0.0 0.0
1.0 0.0 0.0
0.0 1.0 0.0
As a demo, save the above three lines to a file called simple.xyz and call the executable resulting from the code below with
./SimplePointsReader simple.xyz
from the build directory.
Seealso
For the reverse operation, writing a points file, see the SimplePointsWriter example.
Code¶
SimplePointsReader.cxx
#include <vtkSmartPointer.h> #include <vtkSimplePointsReader.h> #include <vtkPolyDataMapper.h> #include <vtkActor.h> #include <vtkProperty.h> #include <vtkRenderer.h> #include <vtkRenderWindow.h> #include <vtkRenderWindowInteractor.h> int main(int argc, char* argv[]) { // Verify input arguments if ( argc != 2 ) { std::cout << "Usage: " << argv[0] << " Filename(.xyz)" << std::endl; return EXIT_FAILURE; } // Read the file vtkSmartPointer<vtkSimplePointsReader> reader = vtkSmartPointer<vtkSimplePointsReader>::New(); reader->SetFileName ( argv[1] ); reader->Update(); // Visualize vtkSmartPointer<vtkPolyDataMapper> mapper = vtkSmartPointer<vtkPolyDataMapper>::New(); mapper->SetInputConnection(reader->GetOutputPort()); vtkSmartPointer<vtkActor> actor = vtkSmartPointer<vtkActor>::New(); actor->SetMapper(mapper); actor->GetProperty()->SetPointSize(4); vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderer> renderer = vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderer>::New(); renderer->AddActor(actor); renderer->SetBackground(.3, .6, .3); // Background color green vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderWindow> renderWindow = vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderWindow>::New(); renderWindow->AddRenderer(renderer); vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderWindowInteractor> renderWindowInteractor = vtkSmartPointer<vtkRenderWindowInteractor>::New(); renderWindowInteractor->SetRenderWindow(renderWindow); renderWindowInteractor->Start(); return EXIT_SUCCESS; }
CMakeLists.txt¶
cmake_minimum_required(VERSION 2.8) PROJECT(SimplePointsReader) find_package(VTK REQUIRED) include(${VTK_USE_FILE}) add_executable(SimplePointsReader MACOSX_BUNDLE SimplePointsReader.cxx) target_link_libraries(SimplePointsReader ${VTK_LIBRARIES})
Download and Build SimplePointsReader¶
Danger
The generation of tar files has not been ported to the new VTKExamples. Some tarballs may be missing or out-of-date.
Click here to download SimplePointsReader and its CMakeLists.txt file. Once the tarball SimplePointsReader.tar has been downloaded and extracted,
cd SimplePointsReader/build
If VTK is installed:
cmake ..
If VTK is not installed but compiled on your system, you will need to specify the path to your VTK build:
cmake -DVTK_DIR:PATH=/home/me/vtk_build ..
Build the project:
make
and run it:
./SimplePointsReader
WINDOWS USERS PLEASE NOTE: Be sure to add the VTK bin directory to your path. This will resolve the VTK dll's at run time.