Connecting nodes

Nodes connect through sockets: outputs on the right of a node, inputs on the left. A wire carries a value from an output to an input, and the graph reads left to right, from the nodes where values enter to the single Output node where the result leaves. This page covers the mechanics of drawing, replacing, and removing those wires. For the rule about which sockets are allowed to connect, see Data types.

Draw a wire

Press on an output socket and drag to an input socket on another node, then release. Spectralite completes the wire only when the two sockets carry the same data type, so an incompatible target will not accept the drop. You can drag in either direction; starting from the input socket and dragging back to an output works the same way.

A wire always joins sockets of the same type. There are no implicit conversions, so when you need to move between types, place a conversion node in the path. Data types lists every conversion and the node that performs it.

Add a node while wiring

To place a new node, press Shift+A to open the add-node search at the cursor, or right-click the canvas for the same list grouped by category. Both let you filter by name and drop the node where you clicked. Enum sockets are the one kind you never wire; you set those from a dropdown on the node itself.

Fan out and replace

An output socket can feed as many inputs as you like. Wire it to several downstream nodes and each one receives the same value, so a single source, a time value or a fixture position, can drive many branches of an effect at once.

An input socket holds one wire at a time. Drag a new wire onto an input that already has one and the new connection replaces the old, which is the quick way to reroute a downstream node onto a different source.

Remove a wire

Click a wire to select it, then press Delete or Backspace to remove it. The same keys remove a selected node.

Data flow and order

The graph is directed and left to right. A node computes only after the nodes feeding its inputs have computed, so Spectralite orders evaluation by dependency during compilation: source nodes first, then everything downstream, ending at Output.

Every graph resolves to exactly one Output node, the sink that writes the final color (and any movement parameters) to the fixture. A node that has no path to Output is left out of the compiled effect and produces nothing, so wiring a node into Output, directly or through others, is what makes it take effect. A graph with no Output node lights nothing at all.

Cycles are not allowed

A wire cannot loop back to a node that already feeds it, whether directly or through a chain of other nodes. Spectralite blocks the connection when it would create a cycle. Iteration has its own dedicated construct, the Repeat Zone in the Utility category, which runs a bounded loop with feedback between passes instead of a raw cycle in the graph.