VisIt 2.13 Release Notes

Welcome to VisIt's release notes page. This page describes the important enhancements and bug-fixes that were added to this release.

Sections

- Features for all users
- Changes in GUI behavior
- Changes to file format readers
- Changes to plots
- Changes to operators
- Changes to picks and queries
- Other bug fixes
- Configuration changes
- Changes for build_visit
- Changes for VisIt developers

General features added in version 2.13

- Enhanced the database read/export options that contain enums to present the string form of the enum via the cli. Setting the option will accept an int or a valid string and print error messages if either is invalid for the option being set.
- Enhanced the SeedMe window to clear all forms by default when the window is closed. The Settings tab has a new checkbox Clear all tabs on close to control this behavior. If modified, the option will be saved in VisIt's config file when settings are saved.
- Enhanced the movie encoding scripts to utilize ffmeg on Windows if it is found in the PATH environment variable.

Changes in GUI behavior for version 2.13

- Corrected a bug where some buttons in the GUI that display variable menus were disabled. Under certain circumstances, this impacted, for example, the Scatter Plot Wizard making it impossible to select variables to plot.

File format reader changes in version 2.13

- Enhanced the EnSight reader to handle variables not defined on all parts. Part descriptions are now used to fill out the SIL. Particles supplied in measured files are now supported as a separate mesh.
- Corrected a bug with the VTK reader reading .pvti data.
- Corrected a bug plotting SAMRAI data where blank plots would get generated when curvilinear mesh blocks are completely surrounded by a layer of ghost zones.
- Added a reader for the SPCTH (Spy) file format.
- Updated the Blueprint reader to use Conduit v0.3.0 and incorporate Mesh Blueprint changes.
- Enhanced the VTK reader to support '.pvtk' files.

Changes to VisIt's plots in version 2.13

- Removed unused attributes from the Boundary plot. This includes the attributes that were intended to be used for point glyphing (pointSize, pointType, pointSizeVarEnabled, pointSizeVar, pointSizePixels), as well as, the attributes boundaryType and filledFlag. Old python scripts, session and config files with these attributes should still work.
- Removed unused attribtes from the FilledBoundary plot. This includes the attributes boundaryType and filledFlag. Old python scripts, session and config files with these attributes should still work.
- Removed unused attributes from the Subset plot. This includes the attribute filledFlag. Old python scripts, session and config files with this attribute set should still work.
- Removed legacy support for non-material (e.g. domains, levels) variables from the Boundary and FilledBoundary plots. Old session files and python scripts specifying non-material variables for Boundary or FilledBoundary plots will fail. Changing the plot type in scripts or session files to Subset should allow them to work.
- Removed legacy support for material variables from the Subset plot. Old session files and python scripts specifying material variables for Subset plot will fail. Changing the plot type to FilledBoundary should allow them to work.

Changes to VisIt's operators in version 2.13

- Enhanced the Threshold operator to allow users to input a list of ranges to threshold a single variable on. For example, to only select zones with values in the range 1 to 5 and 7 to 10, you would specify "1:5, 7:10".

Changes to VisIt's picks and queries in version 2.13

- Changed the default for Queries that operate on either Original or Actual data from Original to Actual. This makes them consistent with all the other queries that only operate on Actual data. Affected Queries include Min, Max, MinMax, NumNodes, NumZones and Spatial Extents. In the GUI, you will notice that the Actual Data button is the one activated by default for these queries, and from the cli, the use_actual_data parameter defaults to 1 if not set explicitly. This will also affect QueryOverTime for any of these queries.
- Improved the error messages that Pick returns to prevent messages regarding expressions unrelated to the current Pick or the current problem it encountered.
- Corrected a NodePick failure with certain datasets.
- Corrected a bug with NodePick where performing a NodePick on a Sliced Boundary plot would place the pick letter in wrong location.
- Improved the accuracy and performance of picking on lines/line meshes in 3D.
- Corrected a bug with query-over-time when running in parallel so that it only created a single curve for each result.
- Corrected a bug with the XRay Image query, where the data type for bov output was incorrectly set to float in the case where the intensities were double or integer.
- Enhanced pick highlights to overlay the plots so that internal zones can still be seen.
- Added PickByZoneLabel and PickByNodeLabel for databases that support labels.
- Corrected a memory error with using pick highlights that could cause an engine crash.
- Modified the cli so that picking ranges of elements now returns a python dictionary of results indexed by element id or label

Other bugs fixed in version 2.13

- Modified the VTK export options to more explicitly state the combination of Legacy+[Ascii/Binary], XML+[Ascii/Binary]
- Removed the "Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) rz network" entry from the list of network configurations to install when installing on Windows since that configuration only works when running VisIt directly on the rz machines.
- Corrected the documentation regarding Eigenvector and Eigenvalue expression functions to indicate that they only work for symmetric tensors. In addition, documentation was added to indicate that the Eigenvector expression result must be transposed in order to use the component index operator to access a given eigenvector.
- Corrected a bug with using transparency in scalable rendering mode that caused a crash when running in parallel on Windows.
- Fixed a type related compile error in vtkMergeTree that broke builds with gcc 4.9 on Raspberry Pis.
- Corrected an issue with newer versions of the Mac operating system (10.13, High Sierra), where VisIt couldn't connect to remote instances of VisIt.
- Corrected a bug constructing material plots from database plugins that serve up dense volume fractions.
- Corrected a bug saving images greater than screen resolution using non-screen capture on Windows.

Configuration changes in version 2.13

- Removed the host profiles for the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories' Rzmerl and Rzzeus systems, which were retired.
- Removed the host profiles for the Argonne National Laboratories' Cosmea and TeraGrid systems, which were retired.
- Removed the host profiles for running client/server to machines at TACC. Users should use VNC instead as described here.

Build features added in version 2.13

- Enhanced build_visit to support OpenSWR. OpenSWR is an Intel software renderer that is now part of Mesa. OpenSWR should not be enabled with mesa. To enable OpenSWR add the flags "--llvm --openswr" to the command line. When you build visit with OpenSWR support it will use the Mesa llvmpipe renderer by default. To enable the OpenSWR renderer you will need to set the GALLIUM_DRIVER environment variable to swr (e.g. "setenv GALLIUM_DRIVER swr"). When VisIt runs with OpenSWR it will print AVX or AVX2 to the terminal depending on the type of Intel CPU you are running on.
- Modified build_visit to build Qt 5 by default. The option "--qt5" has been removed, the option "--qt4" has been added and "--qt" now builds Qt 5.
- Updated build_visit to build PySide 2 when specifying --pyside when using Qt 5.
- Updated build_visit to build CMake version 3.8.1.
- Updated build_visit to properly build numpy and seedme on systems without zlib or ssl. If zlib is missing you should add "--zlib" to the build_visit command line. If ssl is missing you should add "--openssl" to the build_visit command line.
- Removed the gui option from build_visit.

Changes for VisIt developers in version 2.13

- Corrected the spelling of the CHECK_THIRDPARTY_SATISFIED CMake macro (CHECK_THIRDPARTY_SATISIFED to CHECK_THIRDPARTY_SATISFIED).

Click the following link to view the release notes for the previous version of VisIt: 2.12.3.