[Linux] Eyesight on Linux

[Sylvain Sauvage]

Hi all,

Now that Studio’s Eyesight has been open sourced, I managed to build and run it natively on Linux 🥳 and to make Studio use it seamlessly 🥳🥳 and with the GPU too 🥳🥳🥳🥳

If someone wants to give it a try, I wrote a howto.

[Eugen]

Now that Studio’s Eyesight has been open sourced,
If someone wants to give it a try, I wrote a howto.

I can't find a link to download Eyesight source on BrickLink publicsite (and linked thread on BrickLink Forum requires to login), but the link in the howto works. Thanks.

• https://blstudio.s3.amazonaws.com/Eyesight/Eyesight.zip

Guess, howto info and download link should be added to Eyesight's wiki page: https://wiki.ldraw.org/wiki/Eyesight

Note that, Eyesight, as a fork of Blender Cycles (licensed under GPL), should be open-source by default from the initial release of this fork.

[Orion Pobursky]

There's no repo, the page is linked in the forum post.

[Eugen]

There's no repo, the page is linked in the forum post.

Maybe, I don't know as I'm not logged in into BrickLink (and forum is not public).

But on BrickLink public site there is no info on open-source parts of BL Studio, except for the FFMPEG (LGPL-licensed), that is mentioned as used by render (i.e. by Eyeseight):

• https://studio.download.bricklink.info/S...-4.0.2.zip
  

And nothing about Eyeseight licensing (Cycles render source is under Apache 2.0, that has been changed from GPL in 2013), and there was no announcement on releasing the source in a form of public blog or news post elsewhere except here and in the same thread on Eurobricks, which are based on non-public BrickLink forum post.

There was also a 2021 thread on Blender DevTalk, unveilng that they even included bits of GPL-source in closed source BL Studio (not sure it was just in Eyesight render, or in another part of BL Studio): https://devtalk.blender.org/t/on-what-ve...ased/17566

Got bored, did some digging in their binary, they built using some of our our svn libraries (I know it’s our libs since the paths embedded for some of the source files are local to my computer light_smile: ) which makes it easy to track down

they ship openimageio 1.7.15 which means the code is likely from somewhere in between 2017-06-04 and 2018-08-27 which is indeed around the 2.79 time frame.

It would have been nice if they kept the code opensource, so it could get all the improvements blender makes easily, but they seemingly chose not to go that way. which is somewhat strange since they clearly lifted the GPL licensed bf_blenlib [1] so the closed source nature of eyesight is odd to say the least.

[1] the executable contains strings like

Code:

Error! Could not get the Windows Directory - Defaulting to Blender installation Dir! , Error! Could not get the Windows Directory - Defaulting to first valid drive! Path might be invalid! and BLI_dynstr_append text too long or format error.

that can only could have come from bf_blenlib

Anyway, link to https://blstudio.s3.amazonaws.com/Eyesight/Eyesight.zip and http://slswww.free.fr/build_linux.html should be added into Eyesight's page on LDraw Wiki.

Also, the "How to" article and linked files in it should be backuped while they are accesible now.

[Eugen]

There's no repo, the page is linked in the forum post.

I would like to quote your old tweet: https://twitter.com/billtfish/status/163...9076057089

The https://Stud.io has been historically bad with attribution of their sources. LDraw had to contact them directly to get them to acknowledge use in their about page and most average users still don't know that the Stud.io's library is back by LDraw

UPDATE: I found a public page where the BL Studio used sources linked: https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079

BrickLink uses:

• Exchange rates from Bloomberg Currency Data
  
• Vignette renders created using LDraw - http://www.ldraw.org/, MLCad - http://www.lm-software.com/mlcad/, L3PAdd-on and Pov-Ray
  
• The feedback brick icons, me icon, collage icon and blue and green fire helmet icons were designed by MilesFinlay.
  
• Multiple open-source Javascript libraries, (view licenses for group A - http://static.bricklink.com/oss_license_...utions.txt, view licenses for group B - http://static2.bricklink.com/oss_license...utions.txt)
  

All pages use UTF-8 encoding.

BrickLink is hosted by Amazon Web Services.

BrickLink Studio & PartDesigner use:

• PovRay 3.7 (modified) (download source code) - https://studio.download.bricklink.info/S...studio.zip
  
• I18N libraries (download source code) - https://studio.download.bricklink.info/S...y/I18N.zip
  
• EyeSight renderer (download source code) - https://studio.download.bricklink.info/E...esight.zip
  

[Orion Pobursky]

I assert that the BL forum is public, anybody can create an account. It's not even that onerous of a process requiring minimal info from you.

Regardless, here's the another publicly available page where the source is linked:
https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079

[Eugen]

Regardless, here's the another publicly available page where the source is linked:
https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079

You commented just one minute faster, when I edited my previous comment with adding this page, as I just discovered it too.

But, as you can see even this help page is not mentioned on BL Studio main page:

• https://studio.bricklink.com
  

(where only FFMPEG is mentioned, while in same time it is not mentioned on linked https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079)

[Orion Pobursky]

I would like to quote your old tweet: https://twitter.com/billtfish/status/163...9076057089

I'm aware of my tweet and I stand by it.

In this case, just like with LDraw, it took some arm twisting but they eventually did the right thing. 

I can simultaneously be satisfied with their current actions, disappointed that it took community pressure, and wish they would do more to support the community that enables them.

[Sylvain Sauvage]

Hi,

About the absence of link: The link to Eyesight’s source code was in the paragraph about Eyesight on Studio’s download page (where there’s only ffmpeg now).
The page was re-written recently.  I’ll ask if dropping the link was intentional.

About the rights: It’s sad to say but “borrowing” things without acknowledgement is the least of the infringements that are SOP in some branches of the software industry.  Remember Studio was created (when BL was owned) by a game company and Eyesight was subcontracted to another company (it’s not me, it’s the subcontractor…).  They indeed needed to be pressured to do the right thing but they eventually did.

[Eugen]

About the absence of link: The link to Eyesight’s source code was in the paragraph about Eyesight on Studio’s download page (where there’s only ffmpeg now).
The page was re-written recently.  I’ll ask if dropping the link was intentional.

If you would contact them, ask them to move link to FFmpeg sources used to the https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079 page, and on Studio Download page just add the next note instead:

"The list of used sources can be found at the Help Center accesible via the next link: https://www.bricklink.com/help.asp?helpID=2079"