# SoRayPickAction Class Reference
[Actions]

`#include <Inventor/actions/SoRayPickAction.h>`

Inheritance diagram for SoRayPickAction:

List of all members.

## Detailed Description

The SoRayPickAction class does ray intersection with scene graphs.

For interaction with the scene graph geometry, it is necessary to be able to do intersection testing for rays. This functionality is provided by the SoRayPickAction class.

SoRayPickAction can be used to pass arbitrary rays through the scene for intersection detections, by using the setRay() method.

Because a very common operation is to check for intersections along the ray from the mousecursor upon mouseclicks, it also contains convenience methods for setting up a ray from the near plane to the far plane from the 2D mousecursor coordinates. See the setPoint() and setNormalizedPoint() methods. A simple usage example for this case is presented below.

Note that one common mistake when using a raypick action to intersect from a point under the mousecursor after a mouseclick is that one tries to apply it to a scenegraph that does not contain a camera explicitly set up by the application programmer. Without a camera as part of the traversal, the raypick action does not know which view volume to send the ray through.

In this regard, be aware that the getSceneGraph() call in the So*-libraries' viewer classes will return the root of the user-supplied scenegraph, not the "real" internal scenegraph root used by the viewer (which should always contain a camera node). So raypicks done from the application code will fail when doing this:

      // initializing viewer scenegraph
      SoSeparator * root = new SoSeparator;
      root->ref();

      SoEventCallback * ecb = new SoEventCallback;
      ecb->addEventCallback(SoMouseButtonEvent::getClassTypeId(), event_cb, viewer);
      root->addChild(ecb);

      root->addChild(new SoCone);

      viewer->setSceneGraph( root );
      // -- [snip] -------------------------

      // attempting raypick in the event_cb() callback method
      SoRayPickAction rp( viewer->getViewportRegion() );
      rp.setPoint(mouseevent->getPosition());
      rp.apply(viewer->getSceneGraph());
      // BUG: results will not be what you expected, as no camera was
      // part of the "user's scenegraph"

While this is the correct way to do it:

      // initializing viewer scenegraph
      SoSeparator * root = new SoSeparator;
      root->ref();

      // Need to set up our own camera in the "user scenegraph", or else
      // the raypick action will fail because the camera is hidden in the
      // viewer-specific root of the scenegraph.
      SoPerspectiveCamera * pcam = new SoPerspectiveCamera;
      root->addChild(pcam);

      SoEventCallback * ecb = new SoEventCallback;
      ecb->addEventCallback(SoMouseButtonEvent::getClassTypeId(), event_cb, viewer);
      root->addChild(ecb);

      root->addChild(new SoCone);

      viewer->setSceneGraph( root );
      pcam->viewAll( root, viewer->getViewportRegion() );
      // -- [snip] -------------------------

      // attempting raypick in the event_cb() callback method
      SoRayPickAction rp( viewer->getViewportRegion() );
      rp.setPoint(mouseevent->getPosition());
      rp.apply(viewer->getSceneGraph());

Or if you do want the convenience of having the viewer set up a camera for you implicitly, you can get hold of the root-node of the "complete" scenegraph by simply calling:

      SoNode * realroot = viewer->getSceneManager()->getSceneGraph();

## Public Member Functions

| SoRayPickAction (const SbViewportRegion &viewportregion)
virtual | ~SoRayPickAction ()
void | setPoint (const SbVec2s &viewportPoint)
void | setNormalizedPoint (const SbVec2f &normpoint)
void | setRadius (const float radiusinpixels)
void | setRay (const SbVec3f &start, const SbVec3f &direction, float neardistance=-1.0, float fardistance=-1.0)
void | setPickAll (const SbBool flag)
SbBool | isPickAll (void) const
const SoPickedPointList & | getPickedPointList (void) const
SoPickedPoint * | getPickedPoint (const int index=0) const
void | computeWorldSpaceRay (void)
SbBool | hasWorldSpaceRay (void) const
void | setObjectSpace (void)
void | setObjectSpace (const SbMatrix &matrix)
SbBool | intersect (const SbVec3f &v0, const SbVec3f &v1, const SbVec3f &v2, SbVec3f &intersection, SbVec3f &barycentric, SbBool &front) const
SbBool | intersect (const SbVec3f &v0, const SbVec3f &v1, SbVec3f &intersection) const
SbBool | intersect (const SbVec3f &point) const
SbBool | intersect (const SbBox3f &box, const SbBool usefullviewvolume=TRUE)
SbBool | intersect (const SbBox3f &box, SbVec3f &intersection, const SbBool usefullviewvolume=TRUE)
const SbViewVolume & | getViewVolume (void)
const SbLine & | getLine (void)
SbBool | isBetweenPlanes (const SbVec3f &intersection) const
SoPickedPoint * | addIntersection (const SbVec3f &objectspacepoint)

## Static Public Member Functions

void | initClass (void)

## Protected Member Functions

virtual void | beginTraversal (SoNode *node)

## Constructor & Destructor Documentation

SoRayPickAction::SoRayPickAction | ( | const SbViewportRegion & | viewportregion | ) |

| Constructor. Some node types need a viewportregion to know exactly how they are positioned within the scene. For an in-depth explanation of why the viewportregion argument is needed, see the documentation of SoGetBoundingBox::SoGetBoundingBox(const SbViewportRegion &).

SoRayPickAction::~SoRayPickAction | ( | void |  | ) | `[virtual]`

| Destructor, free temporary resources used by action.

## Member Function Documentation

void SoRayPickAction::initClass | ( | void |  | ) | `[static]`

| Initializes the run-time type system for this class, and sets up the enabled elements and action method list. Reimplemented from SoPickAction.

void SoRayPickAction::setPoint | ( | const SbVec2s & | viewportpoint | ) |

| Sets the viewport-space point. This point is calculated into a line from the near clipping plane to the far clipping plane, and the intersection ray follows the line. This is a convenient way to detect object intersection below the cursor.

void SoRayPickAction::setNormalizedPoint | ( | const SbVec2f & | normpoint | ) |

Sets the viewport-space point which the ray is sent through. The coordinate is normalized, ranging from (0, 0) to (1, 1).

See also:
  setPoint()

void SoRayPickAction::setRadius | ( | const float | radiusinpixels | ) |

| Sets the radius of the picking ray, in screen pixels. Default value is 5.0. The radius of the intersection ray will only influence the pick operation's behavior versus lines and points, and has no effect on picking of shapes / polygons.

void SoRayPickAction::setRay | ( | const SbVec3f & | start,
|  | const SbVec3f & | direction,
|  | float | neardistance = -1.0,
|  | float | fardistance = -1.0
| ) |

| Sets the intersection ray in world-space coordinates. Use this method if you want to send any ray through the scene to detect intersections, independently of mouseposition and mouseclicks.

void SoRayPickAction::setPickAll | ( | const SbBool | flag | ) |

| Lets you decide whether or not all the objects the ray intersects with should be picked. If not, only the intersection point of the object closest to the camera will be picked. Default value of the "pick all" flag is `FALSE`.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::isPickAll | ( | void |  | ) | const

Returns whether only the closest object or all the objects the ray intersects with is picked.

See also:
  setPickAll()

const SoPickedPointList & SoRayPickAction::getPickedPointList | ( | void |  | ) | const

| Returns a list of the picked points.

SoPickedPoint * SoRayPickAction::getPickedPoint | ( | const int | index = 0 | ) | const

| Returns the picked point with index in the list of picked points. Returns `NULL` if less than index + 1 points where picked during the last raypick action.

void SoRayPickAction::computeWorldSpaceRay | ( | void |  | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::hasWorldSpaceRay | ( | void |  | ) | const

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

void SoRayPickAction::setObjectSpace | ( | void |  | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

void SoRayPickAction::setObjectSpace | ( | const SbMatrix & | matrix | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::intersect | ( | const SbVec3f & | v0,
|  | const SbVec3f & | v1,
|  | const SbVec3f & | v2,
|  | SbVec3f & | intersection,
|  | SbVec3f & | barycentric,
|  | SbBool & | front
| ) | const

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::intersect | ( | const SbVec3f & | v0,
|  | const SbVec3f & | v1,
|  | SbVec3f & | intersection
| ) | const

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::intersect | ( | const SbVec3f & | point | ) | const

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::intersect | ( | const SbBox3f & | box,
|  | const SbBool | usefullviewvolume = TRUE
| ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::intersect | ( | const SbBox3f & | box,
|  | SbVec3f & | intersection,
|  | const SbBool | usefullviewvolume = TRUE
| ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

const SbViewVolume & SoRayPickAction::getViewVolume | ( | void |  | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

const SbLine & SoRayPickAction::getLine | ( | void |  | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SbBool SoRayPickAction::isBetweenPlanes | ( | const SbVec3f & | intersection | ) | const

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

SoPickedPoint * SoRayPickAction::addIntersection | ( | const SbVec3f & | objectspacepoint | ) |

| This API member is considered internal to the library, as it is not likely to be of interest to the application programmer.

void SoRayPickAction::beginTraversal | ( | SoNode * | node | ) | `[protected, virtual]`

This virtual method is called from SoAction::apply(), and is the entry point for the actual scenegraph traversal.

It can be overridden to initialize the action at traversal start, for specific initializations in the action subclasses inheriting SoAction.

Default method just calls traverse(), which any overridden implementation of the method must do too (or call SoAction::beginTraversal()) to trigger the scenegraph traversal.

Reimplemented from SoPickAction.

The documentation for this class was generated from the following files:

- SoRayPickAction.h
- SoRayPickAction.cpp