ESOLID - a system for exact boundary evaluation

We present a system, ESOLID, that performs exact boundary evaluation of low-degree curved solids in reasonable amounts of time. ESOLID performs accurate Boolean operations using exact representations and exact computations throughout. The demands of exact computation require a different set of algorithms and efficiency improvements than those found in a traditional inexact floating point based modeler. We describe the system architecture, representations, and issues in implementing the algorithms. We also describe a number of techniques that increase the efficiency of the system based on lazy evaluation, use of floating point filters, arbitrary floating point arithmetic with error bounds, and lower dimensional formulation of subproblems. ESOLID has been used for boundary evaluation of many complex solids. These include both synthetic datasets and parts of a Bradley Fighting Vehicle designed using the BRL-CAD solid modeling system. It is shown that ESOLID can correctly evaluate the bou...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2004
• Where: CAD
• Authors: John Keyser, Tim Culver, Mark Foskey, Shankar Krishnan, Dinesh Manocha
• Keywords: Boundary Evaluation, CAD 2004, Exact Computation, Floating Point, Theoretical Computer Science