Sorry if this has been addressed in another thread.

I'm considering trying Indie, but I'm put off by the lack of documentation in . So I have a few questions:

(1) Why no pdf?

(2) Does the in-app doc system work as well as a normal “manual” (as in pdf)?

(3) Is there a decent (searchable) way to read docs (as in pdf), and study Houdini Indie prior to purchase?

Thanks.

Apprentice has all the features of Indie, main restrictions being those to stop you using it for commercial use (renders are watermarked, you can't export a few geo formats). Perfect for learning, and its free.

To add to what Matt said, the documentation is the same for all versions of Houdini. The reason it's not available in PDF format is that Houdini has such a rich, diverse feature set, any PDF doc would be many thousands of pages long.

The HTML docs also have hundreds of annotated example HIP files you can load into Houdini to study and the F1 help system will instantly take you to help pages for any parameter you're unsure of directly from the Houdini interface.

Matt's wiki resource at http://www.tokeru.com/cgwiki [tokeru.com] is a fantasic place to learn too.

To add to what Jonatahin said which was to add to what Matt said: The documentation *is* searchable (like a PDF). And it is constantly being edited and improved, which would require a constant re-download of a PDF, if it was a PDF.

The best way to get started, if you only want to study documentation instead of getting your fingers dirty with the actual application, is to read some of the cookbook examples in the documentation or browse through the (explained) examples.

Marc

DrStrik9
(3) Is there a decent (searchable) way to read docs (as in pdf), and study Houdini Indie prior to purchase?

Thanks.

and the docs are available here if you want to read before making any purchases
https://www.sidefx.com/docs/ [sidefx.com]

Maybe I am underestimating PDFs, but Houdini´s documentation system seems quite versatile:
http://www.sidefx.com/docs/houdini/help/search [sidefx.com]

Apart from that it should be possible for the authors to create a PDF file out of their documents.

You can also install the Apprentice free version. Once inside you can see the help system by clicking the ? icon in the upper right corner or if you want to see what the contextual help looks like, inside the nodes there is a ? icon you can click.