Plugin Categories

Besides its type, a plugin (the scene object) may belong to one or more plugin category or categories such as being a Light, a Material, a Texture, etc.

The following plugin categories are available in App SDK version 7.0:

    Bitmap
    BSDF
    GeometricObject
    GeometrySource
    Light
    Material
    RenderChannel
    RenderView
    Settings
    Texture
    TextureFloat
    TextureInt
    TextureMatrix
    TextureTransform
    TextureVector
    UVWGen
    Volumetric

To get all lights using the categories API:

lights = renderer.categories.Light.getInstances()

PluginCategories categories;
categories.setLightCategory();
std::vector<Plugin> lights = renderer.getPluginsOfCategories(categories);

PluginCategories categories = new PluginCategories();
categories.IsLight = true;
IList<Plugin> lights = renderer.GetPluginsOfCategories(categories);

var lights = renderer.categories.Light.getInstances();

Or to get all plugins that are both lights and geometric objects:

geomLight = renderer.categories.getInstances([renderer.categories.Light, renderer.categories.GeometricObject])

PluginCategories categories;
categories.setLightCategory();
categories.setGeometricObject();
std::vector<Plugin> geomLight = renderer.getPluginsOfCategories(categories);

PluginCategories categories = new PluginCategories();
categories.IsLight = true;
categories.GeometricObject = true;
IList<Plugin> geomLight = renderer.GetPluginsOfCategories(categories);

var geomLight = renderer.categories.getInstances([renderer.categories.Light, renderer.categories.GeometricObject]);

Plugin categories can also be useful to identify which plugin (as source) can be connected to another plugin input parameter. E.g. the plugin parameter definition type (the type you get by obtaining the property meta) besides the other standard V-Ray types like int, Color, Matrix, etc. can also be
Texture, TextureFloat, TextureInt, TextureMatrix, TextureTransform, TextureVector,
and there are plugins belonging to categories with the same and they can be connected to those input parameters.

The GeometrySource plugins serve as source for some GeometricObject plugins connected to their geometry input parameter, etc.