This page is applicable to ParaView Catalyst implementation introduced in ParaView 5.9.

Introduction

Prior to ParaView version 5.9, for a simulation code to use ParaView for in situ processing required developing an adaptor which had two parts: convert simulation data structures to VTK Data Object, and use classes provided by ParaView (collectively referred to as Catalyst) to initialize, and then execute the analysis pipelines on each simulation cycle.

Converting simulation data structures to VTK Data Objects is a non-trivial task and requires understanding of how VTK stores internal arrays and build data objects. Simple mistakes could result in invalid memory accesses or costly data-copies impacting memory requirements and performance adversely.

Setting up and invoking ParaView via the Catalyst classes requires creating and using classes such as vtkCPProcessor, vtkCPPipeline and subclasses, vtkCPInputDataDescription, vtkCPDataDescription, and several others.

In other words, the adaptor ended up with a lot of ParaView specific C++ code that potentially changed between each version of ParaView and needed updates to accommodate new capabilities added.

Since the simulation directly links against the custom Catalyst adaptor developed specifically for the simulation, the simulation too is tightly coupled to a specific version of ParaView. Once built, it isn't possible to switch which version of ParaView is being used without rebuilding the adaptor and the simulation.

To build an adaptor, you need a ParaView SDK. Since ParaView binaries do not provide headers and libraries that would comprise an SDK, you have to built ParaView from source. That itself can be daunting task adding further to the complexity and learning curve.

To minimize several of these challenges, we decided to revisit the design and implementation of the various components involved. To avoid confusion, all the Catalyst and in situ components described so far that are available prior to ParaView 5.9 are referred to as Legacy.

Catalyst and ParaView-Catalyst

The new design is built on following key components:

A stable API that simulation codes can use to describe data and invoke in situ processing pipelines.
A lightweight implementation of this API that can be used to build simulations when using this API.
An implementation of this API that uses ParaView for data processing that is ABI compatible with the lightweight implementation and hence can be dynamically replaced at load-time when launching the simulation.

The stable API is now called the Catalyst API. It is a C-only API that includes mechanisms to describe data and other control parameters (using Conduit API) and trigger in situ processing. It is provided in a separate project together with a lightweight implementation called the stub.

The compatible ParaView-specific implementation of the Catalyst API is now called ParaView-Catalyst and is built and distributed as part of the ParaView distribution. ParaView-Catalyst Blueprint describes parameters supported by this Catalyst implementation for providing scripts to load, computational meshes etc.

A typical Catalyst adaptor developed for a specific simulation, in this new approach, no longer builds VTK data objects, instead simply describes its data structures using an implementation-supported protocol. ParaView-Catalyst, the canonical implementation of the Catalyst API that uses ParaView, provides several ways of describing data and will continue to evolve to include a large set of data-structures and memory layouts used by codes.

If that's not adequate, developers can develop their own custom implementation for the Catalyst API. Such implementations are of course free to use whatever data processing and visualization libraries the developers choose. They can also use vtkInSituInitializationHelper, vtkInSituPipeline and subclasses, to use ParaView as the in situ processing engine.