Collaborative Project: Research on Parallel Raycasting Engines and CAD/CAE/CAM Applications

这是康奈尔大学和杜克大学的一个联合项目的一部分，该项目旨在继续成功地研究用于实体建模的定制硬件。杜克大学正在扩展和改进硬件本身，而康奈尔大学正在为构造性立体几何(CSG)构建软件，将生成的系统与应用程序集成，并进行现场测试。最初的8处理器系统正在升级到256个处理器，以允许并行处理更复杂的对象。与此同时，硬件的数值精度正在提高，并包括标签系统，以允许处理器跟踪对象部分的软件指定属性。软件和应用程序正在扩展，不仅要使用这些硬件更改，还要包括算法改进。在预期的改进中，增强了从其他表示法(如NURBS(非均匀递归B样条线)和边界表示法)转换为该系统使用的CSG树的能力。

This is part of a joint project at Cornell and Duke Universities to continue the successful research on custom hardware for solid modelling. Duke is extending and improving the hardware itself, while Cornell is building software for constructive solid geometry (CSG), integrating the resulting system with applications, and conducting field tests. The initial 8-processor system is being upgraded to 256 processors, to allow parallel processing of more complex objects. At the same time, the numerical precision of the hardware is being increased, and a tag system is included to allow the processors to keep track of software-specified properties of parts of objects. The software and applications are being extended not only to use these hardware changes, but also to include algorithmic improvements. Among the improvements foreseen are enhanced ability to translate from other representations, such as nurbs (non-uniform recursive B-splines) and boundary representations, into the CSG trees that are used by this system.