VMD-L Mailing List

From: Axel Kohlmeyer (akohlmey_at_gmail.com)
Date: Wed Aug 19 2009 - 04:30:36 CDT

On Wed, 2009-08-19 at 09:22 +0200, Nicolas SAPAY wrote:
> Hello,

salut nicolas,

> I'm trying to render a scene with Tachyon. When I use the following command:
> render Tachyon ./img/molecule_0.dat
>
> VMD correctly generates the .dat file, but the tachyon command is not
> executed and no picture is rendered. To render the picture, I have to

this is the expected behavior.

> execute the command manually:
> exec /home/software/vmd-1.8.7/lib/tachyon_LINUXAMD64 -aasamples 12
> -auto_skylight 0.8 ./img/molecule_0.dat -format TARGA -o
> ./img/molecule_0.dat.tga

right. however, with the new materials and display settings
that control all these flags from within VMD, there is little
reason to call the tachyon externally, but rather enable the
proper flags and use the TachyonInternal renderer.

> I can perfectly live with that, but I'd like to understand where the
> problem comes from. Note that if I execute something like that:
> exec [render options Tachyon]
>
> the exec fails with a "file not found" error.

there is no problem. you should have a closer look at the
user's guide. also, the "file not found" error makes perfect
sense, as you are not correctly grokking tcl syntax. everything
in square brackets is evaluated as a tcl command using the
return value of the command text within the square brackets.
so whatever return value the render command produces, the
exec command tries to run as executable, which does not exist.

cheers,
    axel.

> Cheers,
> Nicolas
> 

-- 
Dr. Axel Kohlmeyer  akohlmey_at_gmail.com 
Research Associate Professor
Institute for Computational Molecular Science
College of Science and Technology
Temple University, Philadelphia PA, USA.