deprecate Surface_mesher package

[sloriot]

Surface_mesher has not been updated for a long time and all its functionalities (and more) have been implemented in Mesh_3. We now officially recommend to use Mesh_3 instead by deprecating the package.

Fixes #3237

Fixes #8211

[janetournois]

There is one issue left in CGAL/poisson_refine_triangulation.h , that still uses Surface_mesh_traits_generator_3

[lrineau]

I am quite surprised by this PR. I thought the urgency for CGAL-6.0-beta1 was to announce a deprecation:

• at the top of the user- and ref- manuals,
• in the CHANGES.md,
• and maybe only for the entry-point function make_surface_mesh.

This PR is deprecating all the headers, and then everything that uses Surface_mesher internal now has to move in a rush, before CGAL-6.0-beta1. Is there a chance that:

• we can converge to a stable state in, say, less than a week,
• and that we have the confidence we will not introduce regression bugs in the process?

[lrineau]

In a conversion IRL, @afabri reminded me that this work is probably related to #7891.

[lrineau]

With commit 6547f64 I have repaired the reconstruction plugin, and tested it in CGAL Lab. It seems correct.

On the console:

Computes Poisson implicit function using Conjugate Gradient...
Construction time of the sizing field: 1.2761150000000008 seconds
Total implicit function (triangulation+refinement+solver): 5.9814699999999998 seconds
Surface meshing...
/home/lrineau/Git/cgal-master/Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3/include/CGAL/Poisson_reconstruction_function.h:263:70: runtime error: reference binding to null pointer of type 'struct value_type'
Surface meshing: 10.593293999999998 seconds, 756 output vertices
Total reconstruction (implicit function + meshing): 16.730679000000002 seconds
Reconstruction error:
  max = 0.127707182737539
  avg = 0.0087130995426717341
Reconstruction achieved in 10.024125099182129s

Note that the UBAN sanitizer does not like that code, for a null cell pointer:

cgal/Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3/include/CGAL/Poisson_reconstruction_function.h

Lines 261 to 264 in 6547f64

	Cell_handle get() const
	{
	return Triangulation_data_structure::Cell_range::s_iterator_to(*m_cell);
	}

[lrineau]

Note that the UBAN sanitizer does not like that code, for a null cell pointer:

cgal/Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3/include/CGAL/Poisson_reconstruction_function.h

Lines 261 to 264 in 6547f64

	Cell_handle get() const
	{
	return Triangulation_data_structure::Cell_range::s_iterator_to(*m_cell);
	}

Fixed by 9cd4535. Now:

cgal/Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3/include/CGAL/Poisson_reconstruction_function.h

Lines 261 to 267 in 9cd4535

	Cell_handle get() const
	{
	if(m_cell == nullptr)
	return {};
	else
	return Triangulation_data_structure::Cell_range::s_iterator_to(*m_cell);
	}

Maybe s_iterator_to in the compact container should have an overload for pointers, to avoid that extract test for null.

---

Edit: see the new issue #8260

[albert-github]

It looks like that the STL_Extension.tag is mentioned twice in the used Doxyfile (or the content is contained in another tag file as well).
It looks like that this is a doxygen 1.9.6 problem and is fixed in the doxygen 1.10.0 and later, looks like fixes doxygen/doxygen#10323 it looks though that also 1.11.0 version contains a small adjustment fix doxygen/doxygen#10850 i.e. doxygen/doxygen#10854

In the 1.11.0 version it looks like the message cannot appear anymore except for the C++-20 modules

[lrineau]

Issue with Poisson_implicit_surface_3

The full diff is at https://gist.github.com/lrineau/f5408f2e0c57e35ebf13f48b4778db90

[lrineau]

@sloriot @afabri See 6daec19. There are a lot more dependencies for Poisson reconstruction, now.

[lrineau]

/force-build:wip

[github-actions]

The documentation is built. It will be available, after a few minutes, here: https://cgal.github.io/8248/wip/Manual/index.html

[lrineau]

Looks good, now.

• Tested a few packages with CTest: ✔️
• Tested CGAL Lab with the reconstruction and xyz plugins: ✔️

100% tests passed, 0 tests failed out of 138

Label Time Summary:
Basic_viewer_Examples                        =  71.67 sec*proc (14 tests)
CGAL_build_system                            =   2.86 sec*proc (2 tests)
Installation                                 =   2.86 sec*proc (2 tests)
Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3_Examples    = 129.51 sec*proc (10 tests)
Poisson_surface_reconstruction_3_Tests       = 235.40 sec*proc (10 tests)
STL_Extension_Examples                       =  29.91 sec*proc (14 tests)
STL_Extension_Tests                          = 280.70 sec*proc (72 tests)
Surface_mesher_Examples                      =  32.04 sec*proc (6 tests)
Surface_mesher_Tests                         =  60.02 sec*proc (10 tests)

Total Test time (real) = 152.82 sec

[lrineau]

In CGAL Lab, the dialog that opens with the action "Surface Reconstruction", still mention "Surface Mesher". But I do not know what it could be replaced with. "Mesh_3" and "3D Mesh Generation" both the same issue: they do not convey that the code is only returning a surface mesh, as a result.

[afabri]

This is no problem. We use Mesh_3 as Surface Mesher. In fact even with Mesh_3 we somehow would lilke to have a function called make_surface_mesh.

[lrineau]

This is no problem. We use Mesh_3 as Surface Mesher. In fact even with Mesh_3 we somehow would lilke to have a function called make_surface_mesh.

I have created a new issue #8269 to track that idea.

[sloriot]

Successfully tested in CGAL-6.0-Ic-264