Overview

Trails is a general purpose visual scripting framework for python. It is the successor of PyFlow.

State

Base structure of program implemented, such things as packages discovery, input customization, exporters, base classes for entities and tools.

You can completely remove nodes and tools that ships by default and start your own library from scratch.

You can evaluate programs without running user interface.

We have simple CLI interface and setup.py script.

Expectedly, we faced problems with our runtime execution model, it is good for certain types of tasks despite it is slow. Also, complicated flow control requires cycles handling.

For example current for loop node implementation doesn't work well with any kind of delay stuff in it's body. Of course it can be solved by adding more logic to loop processing, but we don't know exactly how to make it efficient yet.

Road map

We will add new types of graphs (undirected graphs, trees) and algorithms to work with those structures.

Code generation is probably the future of Trails.

We are going to implement more building blocks. Functions - which unlike subgraphs will have single definition and multiple entry points across the program. Objects - very important concept of programming in general, object will have own methods, access levels and variables. Events and delegates - similar to ue4.

Application presets and api for writing own presets. Templates like in any IDE (shader, command line tool, software installer, etc.).

Documentation updates.

User interface improvements and new tools to enhance user experience.

We want to have most python standard library wrapped into a nodes!

Installation

Manual

1. Clone or download repository.

2. Install requirements for your use case.

   requirement lists can be found under trails/requirements

3. To run the program in standalone mode, run trails.py. It can be found in the root folder of repository.

Or using pip

From PyPi:

pip3 install trails

Latest development version. Contains latest features

pip install git+https://codeberg.org/Trails/Trails.git@main

or

pip install git+https://codeberg.org/Trails/Trails.git@dev

Latest release version

pip install git+https://codeberg.org/Trails/Trails.git@release

(削除) After package is installed, you can invoke trails.exe on windows or trails on unix OS. Program is located inside PATH/TO/PYTHON/Scripts. (削除ここまで) Please install and use run.py for the moment, until this installation issue is fixed!

Features overview

• Modular

  Add own node sets, pins, shelf tools, dock tools, preferences widgets, data exporters/importers

• Easy integration

  Trails is a normal python program. It can run under any python environment

• Python3 and 2 support

• Logic and UI are separated

  Main logic elements (Node and Pin) has non gui representation, so programs can be evaluated without GUI

• Subgraphs

  Collapse parts of graphs into subgraphs

  collapseToCompound

• Watch what is going on

  collapseToCompound

• Expose properties from subgraphs

  Any node can share it's properties with owning sub graph node

  collapseToCompound

• Subgraphs import/export

  Share subgraphs with others

  compoundIO

  If compound node was exported to some package, it will appear in node box

  compoundIO

• Python node

  Write whatever code directly into a node

  pythonNode

• Python node import/export

  Share python nodes with others

  pythonNode

  If python node was exported to some package, it will appear in node box

  pythonNode

• Fast node generation from functions

  Single decorator to expose node from function

  pythonNode pythonNode

• Package loading from arbitrary locations

  Packages can be loaded from provided list of directories. It can be your development folder or folder in network drive inside your studio

• Graph commenting

  • Comment node

    commentNode

  • Sticky node

    stickyNode

• Custom input system

  If you got used to specific keymap of your software of choice, you can easily remap Trails input actions

  input

• Drop on wire

  Automatically сonnect the node by dragging it onto the wire

  input

• Photoshop-like history

  Easy to use powerful undo system

  history

  By a single line call

  historyApi

• Property view

  Modify node and pins attributes using property panels

  historyApi

• Variables

  Save arbitrary data into a variables

  historyApi

• Editable shareable themes

  Create and share themes with others

  historyApi

• Data importers/exporters

  Editor data can be exported/imported to/from arbitrary format

• Command line interface

  cmdHelp

  Exported programs can be edited and evaluated from command line without gui

  cmdAddition cmdHelp

• Convenient wires interaction

  wiresConnect

• Wire styles

  wiresConnect

  wiresConnect

  wiresConnect

• Node deprecation flag

  Tell users to update their programs

  deprecated deprecated

• Widgets library

  • Sliders

    Custom Houdini style sliders, value draggers, ramp widgets

    historyApi

  • Properties framework

    Custom widgets for property panels. Collapsible categories, search field

  • Input framework

    Custom widgets for mouse, keyboard capture

• Plugin wizards framework

  Generate package template to start development. Or create own wizard for your module

• Easy configuration files framework

  While adding own modules you probably want to have some configuration data. We provide easy to use api for this

And more..

Getting Started

We have documentation

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md

Versioning

We use a semantic versioning policy.

Origin

Trails saw the light of the world as PyFlow. Since the original author Ilgar Lunin lost interest in further developing and maintaining it, it was forked is now maintained at Codeberg.org. In that process the name was changed to Trails, because the original author did not respond to the request to transfer the name to the fork. (Furthermore, there is already a pyflow at PyPi.)

Original authors

• Ilgar Lunin - Ilgar Lunin
• Pedro Cabrera - Pedro Cabrera

See also the list of contributors who participated in this project.

Discussion

Join us to our discord channel and ask anything related to project!