VTK.js - The Visualization Toolkit for JavaScript
Introduction
VTK is an open-source software system for image processing, 3D
graphics, volume rendering and visualization. VTK includes many
advanced algorithms (e.g., surface reconstruction, implicit modelling,
decimation) and rendering techniques (e.g., hardware-accelerated
volume rendering, LOD control). The JavaScript implementation remains
a subset of the actual C++ library but efforts will be made to easily
port or compile native VTK code into WebAssembly to better blend
both worlds. vtk.js is a true rewrite of VTK in plain JavaScript (ES6).
Therefore not everything has been rewritten.
The origin of VTK is with the textbook "The Visualization Toolkit, an
Object-Oriented Approach to 3D Graphics" originally published by
Prentice Hall and now published by Kitware, Inc. (Third Edition ISBN
1-930934-07-6). VTK has grown (since its initial release in 1994) to a
world-wide user base in the commercial, academic, and research
communities.
vtk.js aims to be a subset of VTK and provide 3D rendering using WebGL
for both geometry and volume rendering.
Reporting Bugs
If you have found a bug:
-
If you have a patch, please read the CONTRIBUTING.md document.
-
Otherwise, please join the one of the VTK Mailing Lists and ask
about the expected and observed behaviors to determine if it is
really a bug. -
Finally, if the issue is not resolved by the above steps, open
an entry in the VTK Issue Tracker.
Requirements
In general VTK tries to be as portable as possible; the specific configurations below are known to work and tested.
vtk.js supports the following development environments:
- Node 8+
- NPM 6+
and we use @babel/preset-env with the defaults set of browsers target.
But when built from source this could be adjusted to support any browser as long they provide WebGL.
Documentation
See the documentation for a
getting started guide, advanced documentation, and API descriptions.
Contributing
See CONTRIBUTING.md for instructions to contribute.
License
VTK is distributed under the OSI-approved BSD 3-clause License.
See Copyright.txt for details.