# MaterialPool

from pandac.PandaModules import MaterialPool

Class : MaterialPool
Description : The MaterialPool (there is only one in the universe) serves to unify different pointers to the same Material, so we do not (a) waste memory with many different Material objects that are all equivalent, and (b) waste time switching the graphics engine between different Material states that are really the same thing.
The idea is to create a temporary Material representing the lighting state you want to apply, then call get_material(), passing in your temporary Material. The return value will either be a new Material object, or it may be the the same object you supplied; in either case, it will have the same value.

## Inheritance:

MaterialPool:

## Methods of MaterialPool:

garbageCollect
getMaterial
listContents
write

garbageCollect static int MaterialPool::garbage_collect(void); Description: Releases only those materials in the pool that have a reference count of exactly 1; i.e. only those materials that are not being used outside of the pool. Returns the number of materials released.

getMaterial static Material *MaterialPool::get_material(Material *temp); Filename: materialPool.I Created by: drose (30Apr01) PANDA 3D SOFTWARE Copyright (c) 2001 - 2004, Disney Enterprises, Inc. All rights reserved All use of this software is subject to the terms of the Panda 3d Software license. You should have received a copy of this license along with this source code; you will also find a current copy of the license at http://etc.cmu.edu/panda3d/docs/license/ . To contact the maintainers of this program write to panda3d-general@lists.sourceforge.net . Description: Returns a Material pointer that represents the same material described by temp, except that it is a shared pointer. Each call to get_material() passing an equivalent Material pointer will return the same shared pointer. If you modify the shared pointer, it will automatically disassociate it from the pool. Also, the return value may be a different pointer than that passed in, or it may be the same pointer. In either case, the passed in pointer has now been sacrificed to the greater good and should not be used again (like any other PointerTo, it will be freed when the last reference count is removed).

listContents static void MaterialPool::list_contents(ostream &out); Description: Lists the contents of the material pool to the indicated output stream.

write static void MaterialPool::write(ostream &out); Description: Lists the contents of the material pool to the indicated output stream.