Building without 2D Content Processing

PathEngine's 2D content processing functionality is included by default as part of the PathEngine DLL (or in the application executable, in the case of static linkage) but is often only required at content processing time.

The full source archive includes a stub library that can be used to remove the code footprint for the 2D content processing, in situations where run-time storage is at a premium and where the 2D content processing is not being used at run-time.

This stub library essentially replaces the various calls into the 2D content processing from the rest of the run-time SDK with code that provides exactly the same linkage but that then doesn't actually do anything except emit a suitable error message.

The stub library can be found in 'SDKRoot/code/libs/Content_Processing_Stub', and replaces functionality found in 'SDKRoot/code/libs/Content_Processing'.

Switching to the stub library for DLL or shared object linkage

In the case of DLL or shared object linkage, switching to the stub lib involves changing the project setup information for the 'PathEngine' project to replace references to 'Content_Processing' with 'Content_Processing_Stub'.
When building against Visual Studio solutions both project dependencies and linker input for 'PathEngine' will need to be modified.
When using the python based build setup a library reference just needs to be changed in 'SDKRoot/code/PathEngine/buildInfo.xml'.

Switching to the stub library for static linkage

When using static linkage you essentially just need to link your application against the 'Content_Processing_Stub' library in place of 'Content_Processing'.
To build 'Content_Processing_Stub', in Visual Studio, just select this project and choose build.
When using the python based build setup you can switch dependencies as described above and build the 'PathEngine' project in order to get this stub library to build.

Functionality affected

In addition to the 2d content processing itself, the 'Content_Processing' lib also includes:

• Code for adding a set of anchors and shapes presented through iAnchorsAndPinnedShapes.
• Code for automatic generation of off-mesh connections.
• Code for combining tiled ground pieces (as generated by 'tile-by-tile 3D content processing), either into a single world mesh, or into federation tiles.
• All code relating to iContentChunk and iContentChunkInstances.