Added some documentation for Volume class.

library/PolyVoxCore/include/Volume.h

@@ -36,6 +36,73 @@ Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA  02110-1301, USA.
 
 namespace PolyVox
 {
+	///The Volume class provides a memory efficient method of storing voxel data while also allowing fast access and modification.
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	A Volume is essentially a '3D image' in which each element (voxel) is identified
+	by a three dimensional (x,y,z) coordinate, rather than the two dimensional (x,y)
+	coordinate which is used to identify an element (pixel) in a normal image. Within
+	PolyVox, the Volume class is used to store and manipulate our data before we extract 
+	our SurfacePatch's from it.
+
+	<b>Data Representaion - feel free to skip</b>
+	If stored carelessly, volume data can take up a huge amount of memory. For example, a
+	volume of dimensions 1024x1024x1024 with 1 byte per voxel will require 1GB of memory
+	if stored in an uncompressed form. Natuarally our Volume class is much more efficient
+	than this and it is worth understanding (at least at a high level) the approach
+	which is used.
+
+	Essentially, the Volume class stores its data as a collection of blocks. Each 
+	of these block is much smaller than the whole volume, for example a typical size
+	might be 32x32x32 voxels (though is is configurable by the user). In this case,
+	a 256x512x1024 volume would contain 8x16x32 = 4096 blocks. However, it is unlikely that
+	all these blocks actually have to be stored because usually there are duplicates
+	in which case common data can be shared.
+
+	Identifying duplicate blocks is in general a difficult task which involves looking at pairs
+	of blocks and comparing all the voxels. This is a time consuming task which is not amiable 
+	to being performed when the volume is being modified in real time. However, there are two
+	specific scenarios which are easily spotted and which PolyVox uses to identify block
+	sharing opportunities.
+
+	-# Homogeneous blocks (those which contain just a single voxel value) are easy to
+	spot and fairly common becuase volumes often contain large homogeous regions. Any time
+	you change the value of a voxel you have potentially made the block which contains
+	it homogeneous. PolyVox does not check the homogeneity immediatly as this would slow
+	down the process of modifying voxels, but you can use the tidyUpMemory() function
+	to check for and remove duplicate homogeneous regions whenever you have spare
+	processing time.
+
+	-# Copying a volume naturally means that all the voxels in the second voluem are
+	the same as the first. Therefore volume copying is a relatively fast operation in
+	which all the blocks in the second volume simply reference the first volume. Future
+	modifications to either volume will, of course, cause the blocks to become unshared.
+
+	Other advantages of breaking the volume down into blocks include enhancing data locality
+	(i.e. voxels which are spatially near to each other are also likely to be near in
+	memory) and the ability to load larger volumes as no large contiguous areas of
+	memory are needed. However, these advantages are more transparent to user code
+	so we will not dwell on them here.
+
+	<b>Usage</b>
+	Volumes are constructed by passing the desired width height and depth to the
+	constructor. Note that for speed reasons only values which are a power of two
+	are permitted for these sidelengths.
+
+	Access to specific voxels is provided by the getVoxelAt() and setVoxelAt fuctions.
+	Each of these has two forms so that voxels can be identified by integer triples
+	or by Vector3DUint16's.
+
+	The tidyUpMemory() function should normally be called after you first populate
+	the volume with data, and then at periodic intervals as the volume is modified.
+	However, you don't actually <i>have</i> to call it at all. See the functions
+	documentation for further details.
+
+	One further important point of note is that this class is templatised on the voxel
+	type. This allows you to store volumes of data types you might not normally expect,
+	for example theOpenGL example 'abuses' this class to store a 3D grid of pointers.
+	However, it is not guarentted that all functionality works correctly with non-integer
+	voxel types.
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	class Volume
 	{
@@ -43,18 +110,24 @@ namespace PolyVox
 		friend class VolumeIterator<VoxelType>;
 
 	public:		
+		///Constructor
 		Volume(uint16_t uWidth, uint16_t uHeight, uint16_t uDepth, uint16_t uBlockSideLength = 64);
-		//Volume(const Volume& rhs);
+		///Destructor
 		~Volume();	
 
-		//Volume& operator=(const Volume& rhs);
+		///Gets a Region representing the extents of the Volume.
-
 		Region getEnclosingRegion(void) const;
+		///Gets the width of the volume in voxels.
 		uint16_t getWidth(void) const;
+		///Gets the height of the volume in voxels.
 		uint16_t getHeight(void) const;
+		///Gets the depth of the volume in voxels.
 		uint16_t getDepth(void) const;
+		///Gets the length of the longest side in voxels
 		uint16_t getLongestSideLength(void) const;
+		///Gets the length of the shortest side in voxels
 		uint16_t getShortestSideLength(void) const;
+		///Gets the length of the diagonal in voxels
 		float getDiagonalLength(void) const;
 		VoxelType getVoxelAt(uint16_t uXPos, uint16_t uYPos, uint16_t uZPos) const;
 		VoxelType getVoxelAt(const Vector3DUint16& v3dPos) const;
@@ -76,6 +149,7 @@ namespace PolyVox
 		//shared. A call to shared_ptr::unique() from within setVoxel was not sufficient as weak_ptr's did
 		//not contribute to the reference count. Instead we store shared_ptr's here, and check if they
 		//are used by anyone else (i.e are non-unique) when we tidy the volume.
+		//FIXME - How do we handle sharing between two volumes with different block sizes?!
 		static std::map<VoxelType, POLYVOX_SHARED_PTR< Block<VoxelType> > > m_pHomogenousBlock;
 
 		uint32_t m_uNoOfBlocksInVolume;

library/PolyVoxCore/include/Volume.inl

@@ -35,16 +35,27 @@ Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA  02110-1301, USA.
 namespace PolyVox
 {
 	#pragma region Constructors/Destructors
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	Builds a volume of the desired dimensions
+	\param uWidth The desired width in voxels. This must be a power of two.
+	\param uHeight The desired height in voxels. This must be a power of two.
+	\param uDepth The desired depth in voxels. This must be a power of two.
+	\param uBlockSideLength The size of the blocks which make up the volume. Small
+	blocks are more likely to be homogeneous (so more easily shared) and have better
+	cache behaviour. However, there is a memory overhead per block so if they are
+	not shared it could actually be less efficient (this will depend on the data).
+	The size of the volume may also be a factor when choosing block size. Specifying
+	'0' for	the block side length will cause the blocks to be as large as possible,
+	which will basically be the length of the shortest side. Accept the default if
+	you are not sure what to choose here.
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	Volume<VoxelType>::Volume(uint16_t uWidth, uint16_t uHeight, uint16_t uDepth, uint16_t uBlockSideLength)
 		:m_pBlocks(0)
 		,m_uCurrentBlockForTidying(0)
 	{
-		//A values of zero for a block side length is a special value to indicate that the block
+		//A values of zero for a block side length is a special value to indicate 
-		//side length should simply be made as large as possible. This can be useful if you are
+		//that the block side length should simply be made as large as possible.
-		//creating only a small volume which doesn't need to be broken down into many blocks. This
-		//'largest possible block size' will be equal to the shortest volume dimension, as a volume
-		//dimension can never be less than a block side length.
 		if(uBlockSideLength == 0)
 		{
 			uBlockSideLength = (std::min)((std::min)(uWidth,uHeight),uDepth);
@@ -119,12 +130,9 @@ namespace PolyVox
 		m_fDiagonalLength = sqrtf(static_cast<float>(m_uWidth * m_uWidth + m_uHeight * m_uHeight + m_uDepth * m_uDepth));
 	}
 
-	/*template <typename VoxelType>
+	/*******************************************************************************
-	Volume<VoxelType>::Volume(const Volume<VoxelType>& rhs)
+	Destroys the volume and frees any blocks which are not in use by other volumes.
-	{
+	*******************************************************************************/
-		*this = rhs;
-	}*/
-
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	Volume<VoxelType>::~Volume()
 	{
@@ -132,54 +140,83 @@ namespace PolyVox
 	#pragma endregion
 
 	#pragma region Operators
-	/*template <typename VoxelType>
-	Volume<VoxelType>& Volume<VoxelType>::operator=(const Volume& rhs)
-	{
-		
-	}*/
 	#pragma endregion		
 
 	#pragma region Getters
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	The result will always have a lower corner at (0,0,0) and an upper corner at one
+	less than the side length. For example, if a volume has dimensions 256x512x1024
+	then the upper corner of the enclosing region will be at (255,511,1023).
+	\return A Region representing the extent of the volume.
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	Region Volume<VoxelType>::getEnclosingRegion(void) const
 	{
 		return Region(Vector3DInt32(0,0,0), Vector3DInt32(m_uWidth-1,m_uHeight-1,m_uDepth-1));
 	}
 
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The width of the volume in voxels
+	\sa getHeight(), getDepth()
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
-	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getDepth(void) const
+	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getWidth(void) const
 	{
-		return m_uDepth;
+		return m_uWidth;
-	}
-
-	template <typename VoxelType>
-	float Volume<VoxelType>::getDiagonalLength(void) const
-	{
-		return m_fDiagonalLength;
 	}
 
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The height of the volume in voxels
+	\sa getWidth(), getDepth()
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getHeight(void) const
 	{
 		return m_uHeight;
 	}
 
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The depth of the volume in voxels
+	\sa getWidth(), getHeight()
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
-	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getLongestSideLength(void) const
+	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getDepth(void) const
 	{
-		return m_uLongestSideLength;
+		return m_uDepth;
 	}
 
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The length of the shortest side in voxels. For example, if a volume has
+	dimensions 256x512x1024 this function will return 256.
+	\sa getLongestSideLength(), getDiagonalLength()
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
 	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getShortestSideLength(void) const
 	{
 		return m_uShortestSideLength;
 	}
 
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The length of the longest side in voxels. For example, if a volume has
+	dimensions 256x512x1024 this function will return 1024.
+	\sa getShortestSideLength(), getDiagonalLength()
+	*******************************************************************************/
 	template <typename VoxelType>
-	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getWidth(void) const
+	uint16_t Volume<VoxelType>::getLongestSideLength(void) const
 	{
-		return m_uWidth;
+		return m_uLongestSideLength;
+	}	
+
+	/*******************************************************************************
+	\return The length of the diagonal in voxels. For example, if a volume has
+	dimensions 256x512x1024 this function will return sqrt(256*256+512*512+1024*1024)
+	= 1173.139. This value is computed on volume creation so retrieving it is fast.
+	\sa getShortestSideLength(), getLongestSideLength()
+	*******************************************************************************/
+	template <typename VoxelType>
+	float Volume<VoxelType>::getDiagonalLength(void) const
+	{
+		return m_fDiagonalLength;
 	}
 
 	template <typename VoxelType>