Editing shaders

Shaders are written in SDSL which is a superset of HLSL.

vvvv does not come with a built-in shader editor. Instead you can use any text editor of your choice. Simply associate the file-ending .sdsl with it. If you now Rightclick -> Open on a shader node, the code will open in the specified editor. Whenever you save the file, the shader noode will be updated.

Syntax Highlighting

For syntax highlighting you have to use an editor that supports HLSL syntax highlighting. Try one of these:

• Visual Studio Code is a lighter version of Visual Studio. Add the "Shader languages support for VS Code" extension and you get syntax highlighting and basic code completion.
• You can also use the Sublime editor with the "HLSL Syntax" package.

Error Reporting

For serious shader coding you'll not want to miss error reporting. This requires

• Visual Studio 2019
• The Stride extension, which comes with the Stride installer.

Additionally recommended:

• Enable the scroll bar code map
• Productivity Power Tools for highlighting the selected word

It will give you the best shader editing experience, including syntax highlighting, code completion, code navigation and error reporting.

For quickly setting up a VS solution that holds all your shaders, go to:

C:\Program Files\vvvv\vvvv_gamma_...\lib\packs\VL.Stride.Runtime...\help\Overview

and copy the \EditShaders folder next to your \shaders folder resulting in a setup like this:

MyProject\EditShaders\EditShaders.sln
MyProject\shaders\shader_files.sdsl
MyProject\MainDoc.vl

Now when you open \EditShaders\EditShaders.sln it will pick up all your shaders automatically and you can start working on them.