PyMesh is a code base developed by Qingnan Zhou for his PhD research at New York University. It is a rapid prototyping platform focused on geometry processing. PyMesh is written using both C++ and python, where computational intensive functionalities are realized in C++, and Python is used for create minimalistic and easy to use interfaces.

Latest documentation

To retrieve the code:

git clone --recursive https://github.com/qnzhou/PyMesh.git

Be sure to save the root directory of PyMesh in the environment variable PYMESH_PATH:

export PYMESH_PATH=/path/to/PyMesh/

Unit tests relies on this environment variable to load relevant libraries.

PyMesh depends on the following tools/libraries:

• Python v3.x.
• NumPy v1.8 or higher
• SciPy v0.13 or higher
• SWIG v3.0.5 or higher
• Eigen v3.2 or higher

Optional library:

• SparseHash
• CGAL
• tetgen *
• libigl *
• cork *
• triangle *
• qhull *
• Clipper *
• Carve *

Libraries marked with * are included in $PYMESH_PATH/third_party directory.

If any of the dependent library is not installed in standard locations (/usr/local/, /opt/local), one needs to set environment variables that point to the correct directories. PyMesh check the following environment variables:

• EIGEN_INC: directory containing the Eigen library.
• GOOGLEHASH_INCLUDES: directory containing sparse hash.
• CGAL_PATH: path to CGAL library
• BOOST_INC: directory containing boost.
• LIBIGL_PATH: path to libigl.
• CORK_PATH: path to cork.
• TETGEN_PATH: path to tetgen
• TRIANGLE_PATH: path to triangle
• QHULL_PATH: path to qhull
• CLIPPER_PATH: path to clipper
• CARVE_PATH: path to carve

The first step is to compile the optional third party dependencies:

cd $PYMESH_PATH/third_party
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..
make
make install

Third party dependencies will be installed in $PYMESH_PATH/python/pymesh/third_party directory.

Now we can build the main project. It is recommended to build out of source:

cd $PYMESH_PATH
mkdir build
cd build
cmake ..

To only build the C++ libraries without the swig python modules, change the last command to

cmake -DWITHOUT_SWIG=ON ..

To build the main PyMesh library:

make
make src_tests

To build all available tools:

make tools
make tools_tests

Make sure all unit tests are passed before using the library.

The output of building PyMesh consists a set of C++ libraries and a python module. Installing the C++ library is currently not available. However, installing the python package can be done:

./setup.py build # This an alternative way of calling cmake/make
./setup.py install

To check PyMesh is installed correctly, run the following python unit tests::

python -c "import pymesh; pymesh.test()"

Once again, make sure all unit tests are passed, and report any unit test failures.