Tom Brinkman wrote:
Just to get things rolling, a few softball questions.
Could you give a short history of this library?
In 2006 I rewrote Intel's internal VLSI CAD foundational geometry classes for point and rectangle etc. to try to make the interfaces generic. I brought the design to boost and got quite a bit of direction on how to improve it. I added manhattan and 45-degree polygon set operations (and polygon types) in 2007. In 2008 I added arbitrary angle polgyon set operations (and type) and finished rewriting the library interfaces based upon the design feedback I had gotten from boost and my own ideas. Earlier this year I presented GTL at boostcon I renamed the library to Boost.Polygon and am not under review.
How long has it been in development?
Since late 2005. Before that other developers at Intel wrote a lot of code that I was able to learn a great deal from. I was able to review the implementations of at least half a dozen implementatiions of sweep line and polygon clipping algorithms.
Is it in current use? If so, how and where.
It is currently in use by 13+ software development teams within Intel's VLSI CAD department for a comparable number of different internal CAD tools. I have 40+ developers actively using the library within Intel. It is in use by at least one external EDA startup where a former Intel employee who knew it had been open sourced wanted to use it.
Does this library have any affiliation with Intel?
It was developed as internal software at Intel and is used that way and we have licensed it as open source.
Thanks for submitting this greatly needed library. A lightweight, boost friendly geometry library would be very useful.
Thanks for saying so, Luke