v0.9.0

Enhancements

• Scenes can be loaded from .zip-file bundles (#358)

  • Allows all scene resources (imported scene YAMLs, images, and fonts) to be consolidated into one package for easier distribution and decreased network overhead.
  • Zip bundles must contain a single scene YAML file at the top-level directory, to act as the "root scene".

• Improved handling of points w/attached text labels:

  • Will only render by default if both the text and point pass collision (#349).
    • Text can be made optional with optional flag, allowing point to render with or without text, as collision allows:

    draw:
       points:
          ...
          text:
             optional: true
             ...
  

  • Multiple anchor placement candidates for substantial increase in the number of labels placed (#351).
    • anchor can accept an array of possible placements, evaluated in priority order.
    • Default is now: anchor: [bottom, top, right, left]
    • Example of all anchor candidates for maximum label placement (speed/# of labels trade-off): anchor: [bottom, top, right, left, bottom-right, bottom-left, top-right, top-left]
  • Attached text and point objects will not collide with each other (enables rendering of highway shields and similar symbols).

• Incremental tile build (#367)

  • Polygon and line features will display more quickly, while label rendering and collision for point and text features completes in the background.
  • Labels for new tile areas will fade-in to provide a gentler transition (note, not all labels are faded in, such as higher zoom tiles when replacing lower zooms, to avoid label "flicker" from rapid fade out/in).

• Improved proxy tile behavior for lines

  • Adjust line width based on zoom level, to prevent proxied lines from being either too small or too big.

Bug Fixes

• Scene global properties can be set to "false-y" values such as null.
• Fix map size initialization issue between Leaflet + Tangram, avoiding initial single-tile render.
• Fix scaling of camera vanishing_point (#372).
• Fix behavior when 0px text stroke is specified (#370).
• Add try/catch and error message for function-based filters (#364).

Internal

• Fonts: use native FontFace API when available to load fonts
• Add debug drawing options for text label collision and texture boxes.

v0.8.2

Enhancements

• Support visible property for text nested under points
• Support visible property for outline block (under lines)
• Trigger scene_import event when a scene import fails to load (#340)

Bug Fixes

• Re-initialize web workers when data source custom scripts change (#346)

Internal

• Remove cache busting URL params (unnecessary and resolves issues with some data sources) (#343)
• Force GL context loss on scene destroy (avoids browser warnings when several GL contexts are created/destroyed in same browser session)
• Preparation to support multiple map instances (#350)
  • TileManager, TilePyramid, RenderState, and VertexArrayObject are now managed per scene/GL context.

v0.8.1

Bug Fixes

• Fix removing and re-adding a Tangram Leaflet layer (#280)
  • Re-initialize Vertex Array Object extension and destroy old VAO bindings for new GL context (#329)
  • Fix Leaflet 0.7.x issue where Tangram canvas could be removed from DOM on zoom
• Fix texture lifecycle management (dangling references on scene destroy and tile build cancel)
• Fix rendering of points with text rules missing font a property
• Fix priority evaluation for text attached to a point (was being evaluated at lower priority than specified)
• Fix centroid option for polygons rendered as points (was being ignored in 0.8.0)
• Text capitalize transform should only modify first character of each word (and leave other characters unmodified) (#330)
• Add small buffer to geojson-vt (fixes edge cases with dropped geometries) (see #333)
• Imported scenes can overwrite scalar properties w/object structures, such as in material definitions (see #339)
• Set polygon min_height to zero when single extrude value provided (matches ES behavior, avoids "inverted" buildings when height is below feature's min_height property) (#337)
• Skip polygons that couldn't be decoded from non-tiled sources (e.g. degenerate/zero area rings returned geojson-vt) (see #331)

Internal

• Restore inline source maps to debug builds.
• Load custom data source scripts before Tangram in workers, in an attempt to increase reliability of large script loads.

v0.8.0

New Features

• Unified point/text style (#306)
• Dashed line patterns (#312)
• Support for custom web fonts (#326)
• Feature selection:
  • Add data source and layer name (see be3640a)
  • Introspection mode to turn interactivity on for all features (#303)
• Generate polygon centroid label positions for non-tiled GeoJSON/TopoJSON sources (#302)
• Data source scripts should be relative to scene file (#315)
• Default updateConfig() to rebuild: true option

Optimizations / Improvements

• Significant memory use reduction (15% to 50+%) from switch to GL element arrays ( #313)
• Significant speed-up (20% to 45%) for processing of complex filters (#322)
• New build process with live reload (#291)
• Better centroid calculation (proper geometric centroid instead of simple average)
• Optimize GL uniform setting (#298)
• Avoid redundant GL calls (for depth function + mask)
  (2d59986, 7a506fd)
• Remove unnecessary normalization of GL vertex attributes (#309)
• Cache some Canvas text operations (816b0ab, 84e7117)

Deprecations

• Remove ability to define textures via "inline objects" (simple URL-based textures can still be defined inline, more complex textures should be moved to the scene's top-level textures object) (18d7978)
• Remove support for custom shader uniforms for GLSL struct's and arrays of vectors/struct's.
• Remove ability to create custom data layers by setting the source:data:layer property to a function (this can be done with the more generic data source transform property (4176ca6)

Bug Fixes

• Fix line width precision loss at high overzoom (#310, #267, #307)
• Leaflet: adapt scroll wheel behavior for Leaflet 1.0 rc1 (note: if continuous zoom is desired, please use Leaflet 1.0 rc1 or above!)
• Support sub-meter precision for height values (#318)
• Support single-feature TopoJSON sources (0a54d8d)
• Fix loading of data URL images in Safari (CORS bug workaround) (a38cd69)
• Fix intermittent failures when loading large scripts with data source scripts parameter (1b559f3)

v0.7.2

Bug Fixes

• Fixes incorrect blending when multiple blended geometries are drawn on top of each other (caused by inaccurate cache state for depth buffer write flag).

v0.7.1

Bug Fixes

• Restore support for material normal maps, which was inadvertently disabled removed when adding support for raster tile normal maps.

v0.7.0

New Features & Enhancements

• Scene imports

  • Scene files can now import other scene files, with a new top-level import block. Each scene file can import one or more additional scene files (which can then in turn recursively import others).
  • Enables several use cases including:
    • Overlays: import a basemap and add new layers
    • Themes: import a basemap and modify color or style parameters
    • File management: split large scenes into multiple files
    • Common components: import spritesheets, shaders, etc. published by Mapzen or others
  • The import statement works by deep-merging each imported scene into the current one. The "child" (imported) file is merged first, with the "parent" file merged after, overwriting any properties shared with the child.
  • Examples:
    • import: pois.yaml (import a single file)
    • import: [pois.yaml, roads.yaml, landuse.yaml] (import multiple files)
  • See #278 for more info and examples.

• Global scene properties

  • Adds global scene properties, user-defined properties in the scene file that can be substituted for values elsewhere in the file.
  • Examples include common colors, language preferences, or visibility flags used to tweak styles.
  • Similar to YAML's anchors & references, but with the added benefit that they can be updated at run-time, enabling features like an in-app language selector.
  • Global properties are defined in the scene's top-level global block, and can be referenced as YAML property values or in JS function filters and properties with global. syntax. Properties can also be nested and accessed with dot notation, e.g. global.group.property.
  • Example:

     global:
        colors:
           roads: red
  
     layers:
        roads:
           data: ...
           draw:
              lines:
                 color: global.colors.roads # global property is substituted here
                 width: 4px
                 ...
  

  • See #263 for more info and examples.

• Raster tiles + normal maps

  • Raster data sources to load raster tiles from a URL template
  • Built-in raster style to render raster tiles, either as a traditional basemap, or optionally masked against other polygon geometry
  • Style functionality for accessing one or more Raster data sources as texture samplers within shaders, enabling advanced effects (e.g. unpacking of custom encoded rasters, deriving surface normals from height maps, etc.)
  • Built-in support for applying raster samplers as normal maps (for terrain rendering).
  • See #282 for more info and examples.
  • Terrain rendering example with geometry masking, colored by landuse polygons:

  

• Linear texture coordinates on lines

  • Texture coordinates for line geometries are generated with a linear scale in relation to the line's width, enabling properly spaced line patterns. (Previously, texture coordinates ranged from 0-1 in the Y coordinate across the whole line, which did not provide any consistent means to scale a pattern.)
  • When texcoords: true for any lines-based style, the value of v_texcoord.x will range from 0-1 across the width of the line, and the value of v_texcoord.y will be a floating number where a unit of 1 covers the same distance as the line's width.
  • For example, setting color.rgb = vec3(fract(v_texcoord.y)); creates a pattern of repeating greyscale gradient squares across the line:
    • 
  • The pattern's aspect ratio can be adjusted by dividing the v_texcoord.y, for example fract(v_texcoord.y / 2.) creates a pattern that is twice as long as it is wide:
    • 

• Simplified event handling for feature click and hover

  • New hover and click events simplify the process of setting up Tangram feature selection callbacks, removing the need for boilerplate code for DOM events.
  • For example, an events object with callback functions can be passed when initializing the layer:

  var layer = Tangram.leafletLayer({
    scene: 'scene.yaml',
    events: {
       hover: function(selection) { console.log('Hover!', selection); },
       click: function(selection) { console.log('Click!', selection); }
    }
  };
  

  • Selection event handlers will be passed the same selection object returned by direct calls to scene.getFeatureAt() (which is still supported and available for custom input/event needs).
  • Selection events can be added, changed, or removed after layer creation with a call to layer.setSelectionEvents(events). See #279 for more info and examples.

• The Scene.setDataSource() method returns a promise, to allow for chaining, e.g. to take a screenshot immediately after updating a data source.

Deprecations

• Generic scene import functionality from #278 allows us to deprecate two earlier attempts at modularity:
  • Remote styles imported via url keyword (see example).
  • Remote shader blocks, referenced by URL (see example).
• Layer-specific properties have been removed, in favor of global scene properties (added in #263).
• Font typeface legacy syntax has been removed (it was replaced by more specific font face properties introduced in v0.4.0

Bug Fixes

• Fix "diamond" style mixin patterns, where a single source style is mix'ed into more than one of a target style's ancestors. For example: style A is mixed into styles B and C with mix: A, and style D includes both of those with mix: [B, C]. In this case, A should only be mixed into D once.

Internal

• The depth function is set to GL_LESS instead of GL_LEQUAL. This should not result in visual rendering changes, but can reduce overdraw.

v0.6.3

Bug Fixes

• Fixes an issue with incorrect not filters with multiple properties (e.g. filter: { not: { a: 1, b: 2 } } was passing when only a: 1 was not true, instead of requiring that b: 2 is not true as well)

v0.6.2

Enhancements

• Increases line label density for overzoomed tiles (those being displayed past their source's max_zoom). See #277.

v0.6.1

New Features

• Feature selection:

  • The names of the matching layers for each feature (fully qualified with . notation) are now returned with the selection object, as selection.feature.layers. See #274. Example:

  scene.getFeatureAt(pixel).then(function(selection) {
    if (selection.feature) {
       console.log(selection.feature.layers);
    }
  });
  
  => ["roads:major_road:trunk_primary:early", 
  "roads:major_road:trunk_primary:routes:early", 
  "roads:major_road:trunk_primary:labels-trunk_primary-z13"]
  

  • Additional information about the tile a feature was built for is also now included, as selection.feature.tile. See 3e03353.

• Shader blocks: the v0.6.0 shader block changes revealed compatibility issues with existing styles and limitations on procedurally generated textures and custom lighting setups. This logic has been revised so that the color and normal blocks are always executed, regardless of the lighting mode. See #271.

Bug Fixes

• Fix incorrectly scaled max label repeat distance logic on overzoomed tiles, preventing some valid labels more than 256px apart from being placed.
• Fix regressions in tile cancelation logic that caused visual artifacts (missing tiles) and/or console errors in applications that modified the scene.config object programmatically and/or rapidly rebuilt the scene (with scene.updateConfig() and/or scene.rebuild()). (See Tangram explorer demo for an example.)