Glossary of terms used with Xpresso and Thinking Particles
Vector: Vector
Local Coordinates: Local Coordinates
Global Coordinates: Global Coordinates
Matrix: A matrix holds an objects information on position, rotation and scaling. See also coordinates.
Normal: A normal is a special kind of vector. By definition it has a length of one and is only used to indicate a direction. An example would be a Polygon Normal that is shown when you select a polygon. A Polygon Normal always points away in a right angle from the front side of a polygon.
Mapping: Converting one range of values to another. A very common example would be a percent value where some real world value (like the amount of gas in your cars tank) is mapped to a scale from 0%-100%. Xpresso provides a specific node for this called Range Mapper.
Ports: Ports are the connection points of nodes. Wires start or end here. An input port can only be used by one wire, but an output port can be used by any number of wires. Ports are either available by default or they can be created via the rectangular colored fields in the upper edges of the nodes by right clicking or dropping a wire on them.
Clamping: Clamping will ensure that a value stays within a set range. You will find it in the Clamp and Range Mapper node as well as in several others. If you have a value that ranges from 1-100 and you have set Upper clamp to 50 the output value will not exceed this value regardless how much higher the input value is.
Vertex: A vertex is a point of a polygon or spline object.
Iterator: An Iterator is a node that is evaluated more then one time in a frame. It resembles very much a For Next loop you might know from a programming or script language.
Channel: A Channel or Data Channel is an information that is stored per particle. It works very much like User Data fields do for objects.
Radians: Radians is a system to measure angles. An angle is given as a value between 0 and 2 times pi (3.14...). It's the most common system used for mathmatical work. Another system that is often used in every day problems is degree (0°-360°). Internaly CINEMA 4D is using radians, so sometimes you have to do a conversion by hand if you want to use degree values in edit fields.
Degree: Degree is a system to measure angles. An angle is given as a value between 0 and 360. It's mostly used in every day problems. Another system that is often used in mathmatics is radians which is based on a range of 0-2pi to describe a complete revolution.
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