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# Katana 6.5v2 Release Notes

# Release Date

19 December 2023

# Previous Releases

- Katana 6.5v1 Release Notes

# What's New in Katana 6.5

These release notes describe changes from Katana 6.5v1 to 6.5v2.

For a high-level overview of important changes in the Katana 6.5 line, please see What's New in Katana 6.5.

# Feature Enhancements

## Monitor

- The OpenColorIO library has been updated with a fix for a regression in the OpenColorIO 2.x.x line (#1884) which introduced excessive precision loss in the NVIDIA Cg shader generator that is utilized in Katana's Monitor tab. `float` (32-bit floating type) is now used in NVIDIA Cg shaders; previously, `half` (16-bit floating type) was used.

  Katana 6.0/6.5 have been upgraded from OpenColorIO 2.1.2 to OpenColorIO 2.1.3, with the addition of the aforementioned fix. Katana 7.0 remains on OpenColorIO 2.2.1, which now includes also this fix.

  The following two Bug entities are addressed by this work:

  - ID 532401 - Monitor view is not reading spi1d files correctly
  - ID 551390 - Katana renders AOVs black when working with a Filmic OCIO and more than one of its channels are set to zero

## Performance

- The JIT compiler of the LuaJIT interpreter used by OpScript nodes is now disabled by default due to memory allocation-related performance issues that can arise under normal usage. It can be enabled by setting the environment variable `KATANA_OPSCRIPT_LUAJIT_JIT_COMPILER_ENABLED=1`.

## UI

- An artist credit can be set on the Splash Screen and About Katana dialog box by setting the `KATANA_SPLASH_CREDIT_NAME` environment variable. If the `KATANA_SPLASH_CREDIT_NAME` is set to "0", no credit will be displayed.

## UI Improvements

- ID 554956 - Graph State Variables hidden using the hiddenVariables parameter in the Project Settings tab now remain visible in the Project Settings tab but are not shown in the variables pop-up dialog window accessible in the top toolbar.

## USD

- ID 547170 - UsdShadeNodeGraph Prims were not imported as ShadingGroups within Katana.

- ID 547185 - When importing usd files into Katana with UsdIn node, nested prims with no concrete type within the Shading context were not retained, causing loss of important group nodes like Shading Group or Subnets. An environment variable `USD_KATANA_NESTED_NODE_DELIMITER` can be used to determine how to concatenate the names of the nested shaders in order to retain shading node uniqueness.

## USD Native

- When using a custom build of the FnUsdAbstraction library, there would be a significant blocking delay when scene data was loaded into the Viewer. Optionally, the USDC_USE_ASSET environment variable can be enabled to further improve performance but this has been flagged as unstable in OpenUSD. See OpenUSD Issue 2773 for more details.

- ID 558186 - The timeOffset and timeScale parameters have been added to the UsdPayloadSet, UsdReferenceSet, and UsdSubLayerAdd nodes to author the `offset` and `scale` metadata on the created USD Composition Arcs.

# Bug Fixes

## Live Groups

- ID 536044 - Actions which may cause unpublished changes in LiveGroup or LiveShadingGroup nodes to be discarded would not always prompt the user before discarding them.

  API for UI4.Util.FileHelpers.CheckForUnpublishedLiveGroups() has been updated to expect a contextText parameter, and an optional parentNode parameter.

- ID 553176 - In LiveGroup callbacks, the "assetPublishing" argument would return "None".

## Network Materials

- ID 528036 - In the NetworkMaterial context, a trailing dot (.) character in the pagePrefix interface parameter, when used together with promoted parameters that are not already nested, caused errors and froze the Material Interface in the Parameters tab.

- ID 555687 - When a material with multiple nested ShadingGroup nodes inside NetworkMaterialCreate node were edited with NetworkMaterialEdit node, connections for some nodes were removed.

- ID 556966 - NetworkMaterialCreate nodes would sometimes not upgrade correctly to 6.0v3 when the material had been created with older versions.

- ID 557189 - In the Network Material context, materials with a mismatch between the 'name' parameter and the node's name (due to the use of expressions) resulted in an error in NetworkMaterialEdit and an unusable material interface.

- ID 558908 - When using the pageRegExFine and pageRegExReplace fields to rename parameters promoted to the Material Interface, these changes were not applied.

## Processing

- ID 558388 - The example Profiling Mock Renderer plug-in has been updated to isolate parallel cooks from nested parallel workloads to prevent recursive Scene Graph iteration.

  The Geolib3 Runtime Client scene evaluation interface is not intended to support re-entrance from a given thread, the effects of which vary according to Geolib3 Runtime implementation, but include deadlock (when using Geolib3-MT with the 'Dependency protecting' cache eviction mode). For further information, see `plugins/Src/RendererPlugins/ProfilingMockRenderer/src/ProfilingMockRenderer.cpp` `ParallelTreeWalker::traverse()`.

## Python

- ID 536671 - The `--prerender-publish` command and the Pre-Render Publish Asset action would error as a result of the `file()` function, which was removed in Python 3. The deprecated `file()` function has now been replaced with `open()` in the Pre-Render Publish Asset action.

## Rendering

- ID 525505 - When previewing a UsdPreviewSurface shader that referenced an incompatible file with <UDIM> in the file path using the GL Render Delegate, Katana would crash.

- ID 553284 - Katana did not accept any further operations after rendering a scene that included an ImageRead node with invalid file path.

- ID 556487 - When Katana was terminated abruptly, either by an external `SIGKILL` signal, or as a result of a crash, the Katana Queue daemon and child processes could remain active indefinitely.

## Scene Explorer

- ID 551606 - When using the 'Collapse Location' action in the Scene Explorer, this wouldn't trigger the unloading of USD payloads.

- ID 552117 - Attempting to load a USD payload on an inactive prim using the Scene Explorer tab would trigger an error message in the terminal.

- ID 554707 - When the Scene Explorer tab width was expanded beyond the combined width of the columns, the exposed space did not register user mouse clicks (left, middle and right) as corresponding to the appropriate row. For example, rather than clearing the current row selection and selecting the appropriate row, a left click would merely clear the current row selection.

## UI

- ID 555573 - Katana would crash when adding the Example Viewer that is shipped under Resources/Examples tab to the Katana Layouts.

## USD

- ID 547790 - When using the UsdIn node to import light linking information, the light linking data was incorrectly imported as resolved and placed in the /root/world location, rather than importing as an unresolved list similar to how GafferThree presents it.

## USD Native

- ID 551426 - When changing the Parameters value of the UsdSchemaSet and UsdPrimCreate node from Local to Force Default or vice versa, it caused unnecessary stage re-composition.

- ID 553690 - When expanding or collapsing Payloads that included UsdSkel assets in the SceneExplorer, they would not bind correctly.

- ID 554357 - When flushing caches, the viewer would not instantly update if there had been changes to USD layers that were loaded from external sources.

# Known Issues

## Catalog

- ID 114182 / BZ 49288 - When exporting a Catalog item you need to specify the export folder path to an existing folder. If the folder you're trying to export to does not exist on disk Katana will fail to export. (This issue is a regression in Katana 2.0v1.)

## Hydra Viewer

- ID 427252 - Locators created via PrimitiveCreate nodes can be snapped to in all modes, rather than just the Lights, Cameras, and Locators mode.

- ID 420882 - Changing between the Viewer (Hydra) tab's multipane layout options quickly can cause a crash or many error messages to be written to the terminal/console.

- ID 380129 - Use of non-conformant GL anti-aliasing modes that employ supersampling reduces rendered point size by the supersampling scaling factor. Katana currently employs any reported anti-aliasing mode (up to a maximum sample count of 16): as a workaround, change the viewerHydra.antiAliasing preference to a lesser anti-aliasing mode.

- ID 352167 - Textures loaded from Hydra shaders are not cleared or reloaded from disk when flushing caches.

## Live Groups

- ID 85118 / BZ 41152 - When editing parameters of a node that is part of a LiveGroup node and reloading the parent LiveGroup node, the UI state of the Parameters tab is reset. This includes scroll bar positions, selections of items, and selections of nested tabs (for example Object, Material and Linking tabs for a Gaffer node).

- ID 84998 / BZ 41092 - When reloading a LiveGroup node's parameter interface and contents from its source, parameters of child nodes that are edited in floating panes disappear from those panes.

- ID 84020 / BZ 40598 - Reverting a LiveGroup node does not revert its user parameters.

- ID 84018 / BZ 40600 - Undoing a revert of an unpublished LiveGroup node does not restore the LiveGroup's editable and modified state.

- ID 83061 / BZ 40237 - Nodes can be dragged into the Group bubble of a non-editable LiveGroup node.

## Materials

- ID 442604 - When "exploding" a NetworkMaterialEdit node in the Node Graph tab into its parts by selecting it and choosing Edit > Explode Selected Groups or pressing the U key, Python exceptions are raised.

- ID 429775 - NetworkMaterialEdit nodes do not currently respect local Graph State changes, for example as performed by VariableSet nodes downstream.

- ID 429302 - When editing a locked node inside a NetworkMaterialEdit node graph, the parameters will be shown at their default state.

- ID 427408 - When entering a NetworkMaterialEdit node whose sceneGraphLocation parameter is empty, warnings are logged by the Geolib3 Runtime.

- ID 423341 - In a NetworkMaterialEdit node graph, connections can be displayed incorrectly if a node's name begins with a number.

- ID 402064 - In a ShadingGroup node graph, the connection between a Dot node and a shading node port can be wrongly colored in some cases.

- ID 269449 - Choosing Edit Shader Parameters from the main wrench menu of Material nodes does not show wrench buttons next to shader parameters. This can be worked around by toggling the edit flag on the node. (This issue is a regression in Katana 2.5v1.)

- ID 199304 - The namespace parameter on Material nodes wrongly allows the insertion of Unicode codepoints outside the ASCII range.

- ID 191052 - Katana does not have any support for the texture reference object workflows of V-Ray for Maya.

## Parameter Expressions

- ID 188533 - Expressions linked to non-local parameters on not previously edited Material nodes can't be evaluated.

- ID 105434 / BZ 47520 - Reference Expressions may not refer to dynamic parameters such as shader parameters.

- ID 60457 / BZ 31790 - Setting an array or group parameter to an expression results in an invalid expression. Upon setting a valid expression (for example, an evaluation of an equivalent parameter on another node using getParam), the parameter is not immediately updated. To workaround this issue, close and reopen the parameter, or flush caches while the node is not edited.

## Performance

- ID 105424 / BZ 47518 - Expressions using getParam to link to dynamic parameters would fail if the dynamic parameters hadn't yet been cooked.

## Python

- ID 496659 - When loading a website into a `PyQt5.QtWebEngineWidgets.QWebEngineView` widget, warning and error messages may be issued by the underling Qt WebEngine classes, leading to certain websites not being displayed correctly, or not being displayed at all. (This issue is a regression in Katana 4.5v1 / Katana 5.0v1.)

- ID 494168 - In the Katana Developer Guide, some members of C++ classes that are marked as `friend` incorrectly appear as `friend friend`. (This issue is a regression in Katana 5.0v1, and may be related to an issue in Breathe.)

## Rendering

- ID 524428 - Misleading error messages can be shown in the Render Log when live rendering with 3Delight.

- ID 523574 - Sourcing an aces v1.3 colour profile can cause Katana to crash when rendering with renderer plugins that don't currently support aces v1.3

- ID 381284 - The 3Delight renderer plug-in makes use of source material locations rather than resolved material attributes as a means of de-duplication. This can result in material data being lost when excluding material locations from the Render Working Set during a Live Render session.

- ID 176598 - Use of nodes that modify Graph State Variables in Interactive Render Filters is not currently supported.

- ID 74799 / BZ 36926 - The rendererSettings > displayOptions parameter of a RenderOutputDefine node for the PRMan renderer, shown when its type parameter is set to 'raw', cannot be set using the Parameters tab.

- ID 70217 / BZ 36176 - The 2D node Disk Render Upstream Render Outputs option does not use the batch render method, batchRender, for upstream render nodes, instead using diskRender.

- ID 70016 / BZ 36137 - Rendering repeatedly with a large number of AOVs consumes more and more memory, possibly leading to a crash when running out of memory.

- ID 12517 / BZ 16168 - Only one Monitor tab may display the results of a Preview Render. The use of multiple Monitor tabs is not currently supported.

## UI

- ID 553608 - Certain OCIO transforms (defined by a custom OCIO Config) can introduce significant color banding artefacts when images are processed for display purposes (e.g. in the Monitor tab or the Monitor Layer of the Viewer tab). Such artefacts are a product of the OCIO 2.x GPU processor applying certain transforms. CPU processors, which are used in Katana's final frame rendering pipelines, are not affected.

- ID 373702 - Clicking in the Viewport and pressing a shortcut whilst the mouse is hovered in another widget will still send the event back to the 'focused' Viewport widget, for shortcuts where the widget hovered over does not handle the shortcut.

- ID 208802 - Closing the Histogram tab after use leaves the Monitor tab unable to display rendered images.

- ID 123558 / BZ 50911 - When changing an array parameter's tuple count/size, any corresponding attributes are not properly updated in the Attributes tab.

- ID 112544 / BZ 49051 - The Viewer tab may lose sync with the Scene Graph tab when changes to expansion state are interrupted.

- ID 107038 / BZ 47853 - Indication of attribute source nodes (such as the yellow 'glow' in the Node Graph tab) is unavailable as of Katana 2.0v1.

- ID 71965 / BZ 36691 - State badges are currently shown for attribute values of dynamic array child parameters, even though only their parent array parameter should appear with a state badge.

- ID 65347 / BZ 34949 - Using Compiz can lead to text fields not receiving focus events correctly due to an incompatibility between Compiz and Qt. Depending on your configuration, disabling Compiz "desktop effects" may resolve the problem.

## USD

- ID 468287 - UsdIn is not retaining expanded view state information for shading nodes in a Network Material context.

## Windows

- ID 381692 - (Windows only) When logging out and logging back in again, the colors in the UI are incorrect. For example, certain parts of certain types of tabs may appear with a white background color. (This issue is a regression in Katana 3.1v1, possibly caused by QTBUG-52728 - Paint bug and palette errors after some events in Windows)

- ID 344118 - (Windows only) When installing Katana and opting to install the bundled version of 3Delight, the installation of 3Delight is made by modifying system-wide environment variables such as `KATANA_RESOURCES`. Thereafter, launching any version of Katana will pick up this installation of 3Delight, which may be incompatible with the version of Katana being launched.

  NOTE: This issue does not affect Linux, where a bundled 3Delight installation is tied to its corresponding Katana installation.

- ID 218742 - (Windows only) Katana must be installed to a path no longer than ~140 characters. Attempting to install to a longer path results in an unintuitive error: "The system cannot find the path specified."

## Miscellaneous

- ID 84326 / BZ 40709 - The Alembic library does not support multiple process or thread access to an Alembic file. This means that a crash occurs when modifying an Alembic file outside Katana, while it's loaded in an open Katana scene. To avoid this, you must Flush Caches before attempting to update any modified Alembic files.

- ID 80738 / BZ 39261 - Operations that lock and unlock nodes do not currently create entries in the Undo History, which can lead to an incorrect node graph state when undoing and redoing operations.

- ID 70196 / BZ 36170 - Control keys (notably arrow keys) do not function as expected in shell mode.

# System Requirements

## Officially Supported Operating Systems

- Windows 10 64-bit or higher
- Linux 64-bit operating system (CentOS/RHEL 7)

## Hardware Requirements

| Minimum | Recommended
--- | --- | ---
CPU | Dual-core processor
Storage | 2.5+ GB available for installation
System RAM | 1+ GB available
Graphics RAM | 1+ GB available | 2+ GB available
Display | 800 x 600 | 1920 x 1080
OpenGL | OpenGL 4.5+ (see note below)

NOTE: AMD-based graphics cards are currently not supported.

## Tested Workstation Hardware

The configurations listed below are those that Foundry have tested with Katana. Due to the constantly changing nature and wide variety of computer hardware available in the market, Foundry is unable to officially certify hardware. The list below can be used as a recommendation and does not guarantee that it meets your particular needs.

- NVIDIA Quadro RTX 4000

- NVIDIA Quadro RTX A4000

- NVIDIA Quadro RTX A3000

- NVIDIA Quadro P4000

Please download and install the latest graphics driver from the NVIDIA website.

If you encounter any issues, please contact Customer Support directly through the Support Portal at the following address: https://support.foundry.com.

Copyright © 2023 The Foundry Visionmongers Ltd.