Syntax to read point string attribute in a font text field

[AntoineSfx]

Using a Block Begin SOP / for loop, I'm trying to generate one font SOP which text is read from a string attribute set on each point

I don't manage to get the syntax right for the text field

It should be something like this: a reference to the node containing the string attribute, an attribute name, and an index, per Houdini documentation:

point(surface_node, point_number, attribute, index)

So I thought this should work:

point("../pointwrangle1/", detail("../foreach_begin1_metadata1/","iteration",0), "letter",0)
 

It doesn't reject it, but it doesn't return the text in string attribute "letter", but the integer value of iteration instead

What's happening here ?

 

odforce.text.hipnc

Edited August 10, 2018 by AntoineSfx

[ikoon]

To return a string value, use points() instead of point()
http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/expressions/points.html
 

The same applies for detail() / details() and prim() / prims().

This should work, last argument (the index 0) is not used with points()

points("../pointwrangle1/", detail("../foreach_begin1_metadata1/","iteration",0), "letter")

 

[AntoineSfx]

Thanks. It's not clear from the documentation that strings and numbers are treated differently.

[Noobini]

was just goofing around and found that if you change your font command to:

points("../foreach_begin1", 0, "letter")

it works too.....and even if you change the 0 to WHATEVER number...it still works coz...everytime it executes for a point there is only ONE point it's getting the "letter" from

A bit more cryptic..but much shorter...

[AntoineSfx]

11 minutes ago, Noobini said:

was just goofing around and found that if you change your font command to:

points("../foreach_begin1", 0, "letter")

it works too.....and even if you change the 0 to WHATEVER number...it still works coz...everytime it executes for a point there is only ONE point it's getting the "letter" from

A bit more cryptic..but much shorter...

yes, no need to mess with nested function calls. I like it better because it seems to refer to  .. the point being processed, whereas using the variable iteration kinda defeats the purpose of having an iterator..

Thanks for the trick, hoping it's no going to come haunt me later