Visualization

RaiSim has two visualization workflows. Choose one based on where rendering should happen.

Workflow	Use it when	Main executable/API
`RaisimServer` + TCP viewer	Your simulation should publish world state and a separate viewer should display it.	`raisim::RaisimServer` and `rayrai_tcp_viewer` (built with the examples)
In-process rayrai	Your application needs direct access to OpenGL textures, RGB/depth images, screenshots, PBR assets, or custom UI embedding.	`raisin::RayraiWindow`

For older Unity or Unreal workflows, see Legacy Integrations.

RaisimServer + TCP Viewer

This is the simplest way to inspect a simulation while keeping the renderer out of the simulation process. Your application owns the world and starts a RaisimServer, which listens on 127.0.0.1:8080 by default:

raisim::World world;
raisim::RaisimServer server(&world);
server.launchServer(8080);

while (running) {
  server.integrateWorldThreadSafe();
}

Start the viewer, which is built with the examples, in a terminal where raisim_env.sh is sourced:

source ./raisim_env.sh
./build-examples/examples/rayrai_tcp_viewer

Then run a server-based example in a second terminal, also sourced:

source ./raisim_env.sh
./build-examples/examples/primitive_grid

The viewer connects to 127.0.0.1:8080 by default. Use this workflow for everyday debug visualization, object inspection, interactive camera control, simulation control (pause, step, push and reposition bodies), and viewer-rendered manual RGB/depth cameras. Camera requests and the returned BGRA or metric-depth images share the TCP connection with the scene updates. See Rayrai TCP Viewer for the viewer itself.

Use in-process rayrai when the application must own the OpenGL context, access textures without a network round trip, include custom render-only objects, or keep producing camera frames without a viewer process. Use RaiSim’s CPU depth computation when rayrai is unavailable, or when a deterministic headless ray query is explicitly required.

In-Process rayrai

Use in-process rayrai when rendering is part of the application:

auto world = std::make_shared<raisim::World>();
raisin::RayraiWindow viewer(world, 1280, 720);

while (running) {
  world->integrate();
  viewer.update(1280, 720, false, 0, 0, false);
  unsigned int colorTexture = viewer.getImageTexture();
  (void)colorTexture;
}

Examples:

source ./raisim_env.sh
./build-examples/examples/rayrai_basic_scene
./build-examples/examples/rayrai_pbr_material_grid
./build-examples/examples/rayrai_pbr_texture_maps

Use this workflow for screenshots, offscreen rendering, dataset generation, custom ImGui/Qt tools, PBR visual inspection, glTF visual import, picking, and direct RGB/depth readback.

Which Page Next?

Rayrai TCP Viewer documents the TCP viewer: panels, controls, command-line options and the wire format for custom clients.
Raisim Server documents the server lifecycle, thread-safety boundary, simulation control, synchronous request loop, and server-side visual helper API.
rayrai Visualizer documents RayraiWindow, render-quality controls, custom visuals, glTF/Blender import, offscreen contexts, sensors, and rayrai API reference.
Sensors documents the recommended rayrai RGB/depth sensor workflow, manual sensor buffers, and CPU-only fallback paths.