magnum/doc/shapes.dox

/*
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              Vladimír Vondruš <mosra@centrum.cz>

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namespace Magnum {
/** @page shapes Collision detection
@brief Collection of simple shapes for high performance collision detection.

-   Previous page: @ref scenegraph
-   Next page: @ref debug-tools

The essential thing in collision detection is to define a complex object with
collection of simple shapes, for which it is easy to detect collisions. The
library is contained in @ref Shapes namespace, see its documentation for more
information about building and usage with CMake.

@tableofcontents

These shapes can be either one-, two- or three-dimensional and they can be
grouped together using various operations.

@section shapes-collection Available shapes

Magnum provides a set of simple shapes for collision detection, similarly to
what is found in many other collision detection libraries. Additionally some
shapes are provided in inverted form -- e.g. inverted box detects collisions on
outside instead of inside, which might be useful for example to create bounds
around platformer game level.

@subsection shapes-1D One-dimensional shapes

- @ref Shapes::Point "Shapes::Point*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Point
- @ref Shapes::Line "Shapes::Line*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Line
- @ref Shapes::LineSegment "Shapes::LineSegment*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::LineSegment

Because of numerical instability it's not possible to detect collisions of
line and point. Collision of two lines can be detected only in 2D.

@subsection shapes-2D Two-dimensional shapes

- Shapes::Plane -- @copybrief Shapes::Plane

@subsection shapes-3D Three-dimensional shapes

- @ref Shapes::Sphere "Shapes::Sphere*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Sphere
- @ref Shapes::InvertedSphere "Shapes::InvertedSphere*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::InvertedSphere
- @ref Shapes::Cylinder "Shapes::Cylinder*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Cylinder
- @ref Shapes::Capsule "Shapes::Capsule*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Capsule
- @ref Shapes::AxisAlignedBox "Shapes::AxisAlignedBox*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::AxisAlignedBox
- @ref Shapes::Box "Shapes::Box*D" -- @copybrief Shapes::Box

The easiest (and most efficient) shape combination for detecting collisions
is point and sphere, followed by two spheres. Computing collision of two boxes
is least efficient.

@section shapes-composition Creating shape compositions

Shapes can be composed together using one of three available logical
operations: AND, OR and NOT. These operations are mapped to `&&`, `||` and `!`
operators, so for example creating negation of logical OR of line segment and
point is simple as this:
@code
Shapes::LineSegment3D segment;
Shapes::Point3D point;

Shapes::Composition3D composition = !(segment || point);
@endcode

@note Logical operations are not the same as set operations -- intersection of
    two spheres will not generate any collision if they are disjoint, but
    logical AND will if the object collides with both of them.

@subsection shapes-simplification Providing simplified version of shape for better performance

If there are many shapes composed together, it might hurt performance of
collision detection, because it might be testing collision with more shapes
than necessary. It's then good to specify simplified version of such shape,
so the collision detection is done on the complex one if and only if collision
was detected with the simplified shape. It is in fact logical AND using the
`&&` operator -- the collision is initially detected on first (simplified)
shape and then on the other:
@code
Shapes::Sphere3D sphere;
Shapes::Box3D box;
Shapes::AxisAlignedBox3D simplified;

Shapes::Composition3D composition = simplified && (sphere || box);
@endcode

@section shapes-collisions Detecting shape collisions

Shape pairs which have collision occurence detection implemented can be tested
for collision using the `%` operator. The operator returns boolean describing
whether the collision happened or not. Example:
@code
Shapes::Point3D point;
Shapes::Sphere3D sphere;

bool collide = point % sphere;
@endcode

As this is useful for e.g. menu handling and simple particle systems, for
serious physics you often need more information like contact point, separation
normal and penetration depth. For shape pairs which have implemented this
detailed collision detection you can use the `/` operator, which returns
@ref Shapes::Collision object. Note that unlike with the `%` operator mentioned
above, this operation is not commutative. See @ref Shapes::Collision class
documentation for more information about the returned data. Example:
@code
const Shapes::Collision3D c = point/sphere;
if(c) {
    Vector3 translation = c.separationNormal()*c.separationDistance();
    // translate point by translation...
}
@endcode

@section shapes-scenegraph Integration with scene graph

Shape can be attached to object in the scene using @ref Shapes::Shape feature.
In conjunction with @ref Shapes::ShapeGroup you can use
@ref Shapes::Shape::collides() and @ref Shapes::Shape::collision() similarly to
the `%` and `/` operators above. Please note that the shape group caches the
absolute transformations of all shapes and thus you need to explicitly call
@ref Shapes::ShapeGroup::setClean() before computing the collisions if you did
any modifications to the objects in the scene.

Scenegraph-flavored equivalent to the above code:
@code
Shapes::ShapeGroup3D shapes;
Object3D& a;
auto aShape = new Shapes::Shape<Shapes::Sphere3D>(a, {{}, 23.0f}, &shapes);

Object3D& b;
auto bShape = new Shapes::Shape<Shapes::Point3D>(b, {{1.0f, 0.2f, 3.0f}}, &shapes);

// Translate point so the objects no longer collide
shapes.setClean();
if(aShape->collides(*bShape)) {
    const Shapes::Collision3D c = aShape->collision(*bShape);
    b.translate(c.separationNormal()*c.separationDistance());
}
@endcode

There is also @ref Shapes::ShapeGroup::firstCollision() function which returns
arbitrary first collision for given shape in whole group (or `nullptr`, if
there isn't any collision).

You can also use @ref DebugTools::ShapeRenderer to visualize the shapes for
debugging purposes. See also @ref scenegraph for introduction.

-   Previous page: @ref scenegraph
-   Next page: @ref debug-tools

*/
}