[Paraview] paraviw + discontinuous/non-linear functions within cells

[Peter J. Bismuti]

We have engineers using a numerical method that doesn't uniquely define values 
at vertices.  For example, if five cells all share a common vertex, then 
generally you can expect five different values at the common vertex.  The 
data is represented as polynomials of arbitrary order.  The data is 
discontinuous across cell faces and edges (a.k.a. discontinuous galerkin 
method).   This is probably very similar to some FE codes so perhaps someone 
already has experience with this type of problem.  

The question is if it becomes necessary to accurately visualize the data, what 
is the best way of doing this?  You could have multiple vertices at the same 
location, one for each cell, but this doesn't take care of the problem of the 
non-linear functions within each cell.  There is a paper (Sandia?) outlining 
a metnod of recursively subdividing each cell by searching for critical 
points first in the interior, then the faces, edges, .etc.   The method has 
already been implemented in VTK.  However, it's not clear that this would 
work in this case.  The opinion of the engineers who use this code is that it 
will not work.  

My thinking is that using programmable shaders (and adding the functionality 
to PV) would be the best solution.  Any opinions?  How much time/effort/$$$ 
would it take to implement this.   Thanks in advance

 
-- 


Peter Bismuti
Boeing