[R] Offscreen rendering in RGL?

[Matthew Neilson]

On 27 Jun 2010, at 22:19, Duncan Murdoch wrote:

> On 27/06/2010 12:58 PM, Matthew Neilson wrote:
>> Hi there,
>>
>> I've written a script for reading 3D simulation data into R,  
>> rendering  it using RGL, and then saving the resulting plot using  
>> the  snapshot3d() function. The results are fantastic! However,  
>> whenever  RGL plots anything it automatically brings the viewing  
>> window into  focus. Since I'm producing a large number of plots in  
>> a loop, my  machine becomes almost unusable for the duration of the  
>> script.
>>
>> When producing 2D plots in R (i.e. not using RGL), I can easily  
>> call  the pdf() function before each plot (and then close it with  
>> the  dev.off() function) so that the plot is written directly to a  
>> file,  thus bypassing the display. This allows me to set scripts  
>> running in  the background, so that I can get on with other  
>> things. ;)
>>
>> Is there a way of forcing RGL to draw to an "invisible" (virtual,  
>> or  buffered?) display that can then be saved using the  
>> snapshot3d()  function?
>
> rgl can't do that, but perhaps your OS can, e.g. you set up an X11  
> server that doesn't display anything on your screen.  I don't know  
> if that's possible or not.
>
> You can avoid bringing the window to the top by setting the top  
> argument to FALSE when you call snapshot3d, but what I found when  
> doing this on many systems was that I got a snapshot showing the  
> overlapping window, not just the contents of the rgl window.  What  
> happens on your system will depend on your graphics driver.
>
> You might also be able to tell rgl (via r3dDefaults) to open the  
> window mostly off your screen.  I don't know if you'll get a useful  
> snapshot from it.


Thanks for the suggestions!

I tried launching a vnc server on (for example) display :4, and then  
using Sys.setenv(DISPLAY=":4") at the beginning of my script.  
Unfortunately, vncserver doesn't support GLX, so upon calling open3d()  
I'm presented with an error message and the R session terminates.

Setting "top=FALSE" in each RGL-related statement does indeed prevent  
the window from being brought to the top, but as you said this results  
in unpredictable output -- in my case, the plot only takes up about a  
quarter of the plotting window and I'm left with masses of white-space.

Fortunately, your final suggestion suits my needs perfectly! I simply  
need to set $windowRect such that the top/right corner of the RGL  
device is at the extreme bottom/left corner of my display. This frees  
up 99% of my display, and I don't see any flickering/redrawing  
(because the only visible portion of the window is the right edge of  
its title-bar). Note that at least some of the window must remain on- 
screen -- if $windowRect is set such that the entire window is off- 
screen, the windowing system becomes messed up.

Thanks again for the help, it's much appreciated!

-Matt