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Omniverse Realtime Viewer

NVIDIAOfficialCreated by NVIDIA Omniverse

  • Skill
  • Tool integration
  • Software development
  • Apache-2.0
  • Medium risk

From the author

Use as the top-level router for Omniverse Realtime Viewer USD apps, XR delivery, SPG GPU processing, stylized rendering, and focused viewer reference documents.
— the description by NVIDIA Omniverse

AutoGineer summary

Written by AutoGineer from the skill’s own files, not by the author

The Omniverse Realtime Viewer skill acts as a central routing and architectural framework for developing USD-based 3D viewer applications. It provides a structured approach to composing rendering, scene state, and delivery mechanisms, ensuring that developers can integrate OVRTX rendering, OVStage scene management, and various UI or streaming adapters effectively. The skill emphasizes a modular architecture where the viewer runtime, UI/input adapters, and delivery systems are decoupled, allowing for consistent behavior across local and streamed environments.

What it does

  • Provides a routing architecture for USD viewer apps, XR delivery, and GPU-accelerated rendering.
  • Defines the separation of concerns between viewer runtime, UI adapters, and delivery systems.
  • Offers guidance on integrating OVRTX for high-fidelity 3D rendering.
  • Establishes conventions for camera interaction, scene state management, and input handling.
  • Supports the implementation of specialized features like stylized rendering and CAE/CFD visualization.
  • Provides protocols for agent-to-UI communication and scene control.

When to use it

  • When starting the development of a new USD-based realtime viewer application.
  • When integrating advanced rendering features like stylized visualization or AOV switching.
  • When building XR or spatial editing capabilities into an existing Omniverse application.
  • When you need to standardize the architecture for local and streamed viewer deployments.
  • When implementing chat-driven scene control or agent-based inspection of a 3D scene.

Advantages

  • Promotes a clean, modular architecture that separates rendering logic from UI and transport.
  • Ensures consistent behavior across different delivery methods, such as local windows or WebRTC streaming.
  • Provides clear paths for extending functionality without disrupting the core viewer runtime.
  • Facilitates the integration of complex simulation and visualization data into the viewer.
  • Standardizes conventions for scene state, selection, and camera control.

Usage examples

“How do I set up a basic USD viewer application using the Omniverse Realtime Viewer architecture?”
The agent will guide you to start with the viewer app reference, resolve dependencies, and implement the core runtime owner to manage the OVStage and OVRTX renderer.
“I need to add stylized rendering to my existing viewer. Where should I start?”
The agent will direct you to the stylized visualization references to implement the required USD/Lua/CUDA nodes within your existing runtime owner.
“How can I enable an AI agent to control the viewer scene?”
The agent will point to the A2UI Scene Copilot reference to implement an operation interface that allows the agent to send commands through the existing runtime owner.
“How do I switch between different render outputs like beauty and depth in my viewer?”
The agent will explain how to use the AOV switching reference to map RenderVars and update the RenderProduct's orderedVars through the runtime owner.

Install

  1. Download the skill as a ZIP:

    https://autogineer.com/agent-skills/nvidia/omniverse-realtime-viewer/download
  2. Unzip it into the cross-client skills folder of your project:

    mkdir -p .agents/skills && unzip omniverse-realtime-viewer.zip -d .agents/skills

Documentation by NVIDIA Omniverse

<!-- SPDX-FileCopyrightText: Copyright (c) 2026 NVIDIA CORPORATION & AFFILIATES. All rights reserved. -->

<!-- SPDX-License-Identifier: Apache-2.0 -->

Omniverse Realtime Viewer

Build responsive USD viewers by composing OVRTX rendering, OVStage scene state, and the delivery/UI libraries appropriate to the app. Use this package for viewer architecture and interaction; use each selected SDK's upstream guidance for installation and exact release-specific APIs.

Start With The App

  1. When delivery is explicit, select its recipe through references/routing.md and follow its current phase. Otherwise start with references/usd-viewer-app/README.md. For an existing app, keep its architecture and read only the references for the requested change. Broad app, conventions and UI catalogs are lookups as needed.

  2. Resolve the selected libraries through references/dependencies/README.md. Preserve the project's manifest unless an upgrade is requested.

  3. Build a working frame and camera interaction in the chosen shell, then add the requested capabilities. Read references/conventions.md for shared input, camera, selection, and protocol conventions.

  4. Use references/viewer-ux-workflow/README.md for broader interface design. Loading, selection feedback, errors, and input responsiveness belong in the first working app, alongside rendering.

  5. Validate the actual delivery path with references/validation.md. A browser screenshot does not validate a native window or a different transport.

Architecture

OwnerResponsibility
Viewer runtimeOwn the live OVStage, publication clock, OVRTX renderer, scene changes, and render stepping.
UI and input adapterDisplay frames and copied app state; send user intent to the runtime owner.
Storage/query/simulation workersPerform their assigned work and return results through the selected integration boundary.
Delivery adapterPresent locally or stream through ovstream; respect frame ownership and backpressure.

Use OVRTX for USD/3D rendering. Browser apps display its WebRTC video; local apps present its output through their native shell. A missing GPU means rendering is unverified, not a reason to substitute a browser 3D renderer.

Keep viewer cameras, settings, effects, and transient edits in app-owned session or runtime state so the source USD stays intact. Serialize scene mutation and render stepping through the runtime owner. Read references/ovstage-ovrtx-integration/README.md for that loop, then the population or data-plane references when implementing scene loading or attribute writes.

Keep expensive loading and metadata work off the UI and render threads. Keep transport details behind a delivery adapter so camera, selection, properties, and loading state can be reused across local and streamed shells.

Add Capabilities As Needed

Use references/routing.md to select camera/picking, scene management, render settings, cloud assets, simulation, editor tools, deployment, or CAE/CFD visualization. Read the selected capability's implementation flow and its linked contract; the full reference catalog is not a prerequisite for a first frame.

For simulation, use the routing reference's Simulation Ecosystem section plus references/realtime-sim-integration/README.md. For UI-driven forces or control, add references/interaction-round-trip/README.md.

For example scenes, use references/usd-sample-data/README.md. When a runtime failure needs diagnosis, use references/troubleshooting/README.md and the selected SDK's matching release guidance before changing the architecture.

Solid Modeling: Upstream First

For usd-brep, exact BRep, solid modeling, kernel failures, CAD topology, or BrepArray questions, first read references/dependencies/README.md → USD BRep. Follow the owning repository's current agent guidance, skills, operation docs, and package API before selecting local integration references. Discover the upstream router rather than assuming skill names or directory layouts remain fixed. Upstream owns modeling semantics, schema rules, tuning, and diagnostics; this package owns OVRTX display, worker handoff, selection mapping, and publication timing.

GPU Processing And Stylized Viewers

For custom GPU processing, chained outputs and lens sampling, read references/spg-processing/README.md. For toon, ink, technical/X-Ray styles, geometry strokes or full wireframe, continue to references/stylized-visualization/implementation.md. Its USD/Lua/CUDA starting node and geometry/depth/composite build sequence work with the selected viewer recipe; use references/stylized-visualization/style-recipes.md for the preset math and references/stylized-visualization/README.md for supporting contracts. Implement the result inside the existing OVRTX/runtime owner and deliver the published processed output. These instructions do not require a sample checkout or a prior stylized-rendering implementation.

For an optional usd-brep geometry source, first read references/dependencies/README.md → USD BRep and the owning repository's current agent guidance, skills, and operation docs; then read references/stylized-visualization/usd-brep-source.md for the display boundary.

XR Viewers

For headsets, immersive viewers, or spatial editors, start with references/xr-viewer-recipe/README.md. Resolve SDK setup and contracts through references/dependencies/ovxr.md; the library owns OpenXR lifecycle and frame submission. For controllers, hands, navigation, or scene tools, add references/xr-spatial-input/README.md and references/ovxr-python-interactions/README.md. For projection-integrated UI, read references/ovxr-composition-ui/README.md and references/ovxr-composition-ui-validation/README.md.

Files

references/stage-queries/README.md

Stage Queries

Triggers

Use this skill for query prims, stage query, find prims, prim type filter, has attribute, AttributeFilterMode, FilterKind, prim_list_handle, selectable sets, effect target discovery, or write planning.

Use this when an Omniverse Realtime Viewer needs to discover prim paths, build a stage tree, find prims by type, find prims with specific attributes, or inspect attribute schemas before reading or writing.

For new OVStage-based viewers, query the application-owned runtime stage. OVRTX owns rendering, outputs, native pick queues, and selection visualization; it is not the source of scene truth for hierarchy, inspector data, transform handoff, pick effects, or physics pose writes.

Core API Shape

Keep a narrow runtime query adapter. The exact enum names and method names should map to the pinned OVStage API, but the generated app should expose a path-keyed result that can be copied into DTOs for UI and transport.

result = runtime.query_prims(
    attribute_filter_mode="none",
)
paths = sorted(result.keys())

Async query paths should stay inside the runtime owner and return copied results tagged with the active stage generation and observed ordinal:

op = runtime.query_prims_async(
    require_any=[("prim_type", "Mesh"), ("prim_type", "Camera")],
    attribute_filter_mode="specific",
    attribute_names=["omni:xform", "visibility"],
)
pending = op.wait(timeout_ns=5_000_000_000)
if pending is not None:
    result = pending.fetch(timeout_ns=100_000_000)

Discard query results whose stage generation no longer matches the active runtime generation.

Filter Construction

Each filter is a (kind, name) pair:

KindMeaningExample
prim_typeMatch USD type name"Mesh", "Xform", "Camera", "SphereLight"
has_attributeMatch attribute presence"points", "omni:xform", "visibility", "inputs:Fader"

Filter lists combine as:

  • require_all: AND. The prim must match every filter in this list.

  • require_any: OR. The prim must match at least one filter in this list.

  • exclude: NOT. The prim must match none of these filters.

meshes_or_lights_with_visibility = runtime.query_prims(
    require_all=[
        ("has_attribute", "visibility"),
    ],
    require_any=[
        ("prim_type", "Mesh"),
        ("prim_type", "SphereLight"),
        ("prim_type", "DistantLight"),
    ],
    exclude=[
        ("prim_type", "Scope"),
        ("has_attribute", "omni:hidden"),
    ],
    attribute_filter_mode="specific",
    attribute_names=["visibility", "purpose", "omni:xform"],
)

Omitted lists impose no constraint. An empty query matches every prim.

For applied API schema membership, have the adapter issue an OVStage CONTAINS filter on usd-schemas with the schema token. Attribute-presence filters answer whether the column exists, not whether a particular schema is applied.

Attribute Reporting

Attribute filter mode controls descriptor payload size:

ModeUse
noneFast path discovery and prim counts. Per-prim descriptor dicts are empty.
specificInspector allowlists and read/write planning. Only requested attributes are reported.
allDebugging and rich schema browsing. Avoid for routine data-channel payloads.

Descriptors should expose enough schema to choose scalar reads, array reads, or runtime writes:

  • name

  • dtype

  • is_array

  • semantic

query = runtime.query_prims(
    require_all=[("prim_type", "Mesh")],
    attribute_filter_mode="specific",
    attribute_names=["points", "faceVertexCounts", "omni:xform"],
)

for path, attrs in query.items():
    if "points" in attrs and attrs["points"].is_array:
        points = runtime.read_array_attribute("points", [path])[path]

Use the same query descriptors before OVStage writes for pick effects, visibility commands, and transform tools so generated apps do not invent attributes that are absent from the active stage.

Tree Construction

Runtime queries return flat paths. Build hierarchy by splitting paths:

def parent_path(path: str) -> str:
    if path == "/" or path.count("/") <= 1:
        return "/"
    return path.rsplit("/", 1)[0]

def child_index(paths: list[str]) -> dict[str, list[str]]:
    index: dict[str, list[str]] = {}
    for path in paths:
        if path != "/":
            index.setdefault(parent_path(path), []).append(path)
    for children in index.values():
        children.sort()
    return index

Use lazy UI expansion: query once after stage load, cache a parent-to-children index for the active generation, and only send children for expanded rows.

Query Handles And Follow-Up Work

Lower-level runtimes may expose grouped query results or prim-list handles that can be passed into dependent reads/writes without converting back through path strings. Keep those handles inside the runtime owner. UI, WebRTC, worker processes, and feature managers should receive copied path strings or DTOs, not borrowed handles.

Python adapters can usually pass grouped path lists into runtime read_attribute(), read_array_attribute(), or write_attribute() calls. C/C++ integrations can preserve runtime query handles only until all dependent operations are enqueued, then release the query result according to the pinned runtime contract.

Gotchas

  • Query filters match type names and attribute names, not path substrings.

  • A specific attribute filter with no attribute names should report no descriptors.

  • Query result descriptors describe schema; they do not read values. Use stage-attribute-reads for values.

  • Relationship-like values may surface as path IDs or token IDs; use pxr fallback for readable relationship target inspection until native relationship traversal is complete.

  • Keep stage load/reset, query integration, and dependent writes serialized through the runtime owner.

  • Do not route stage queries through direct OVRTX query APIs in new OVStage viewers except for renderer diagnostics or legacy samples.

See also: stage-attribute-reads, stage-hierarchy, prim-info-display, prim-pick-effects, ovstage-data-plane, ovstage-ovrtx-integration.

Requirements and compatibility

Works with: Claude Code, Claude apps, OpenAI Codex, GitHub Copilot, Cursor, Gemini CLI, Kiro, OpenCode, Goose, Amp, Roo Code, JetBrains Junie, Factory Droid, Devin (ex-Windsurf), Mistral Vibe, OpenHands, Letta

“Works with” means the tool reads the open Agent Skills format; a skill written for one tool may use features others lack.

Needs: Needs Python, Needs Node.js

The author says: Orchestrator skill. Downstream focused references may require NVIDIA GPUs, ovrtx, ovstream, ovui, OpenUSD, Python, Node/React, Tauri, Electron, C++, or cloud GPU deployment access depending on the selected viewer path.

Security

What our scanner noticed· Medium risk

  • Large base64-encoded blobs
  • Instructions that use the network

A static scan is not a guarantee. Skills are third-party content: review a skill before you let an agent use it.

Attribution and licence

Created by
NVIDIA Omniverse
Publisher
NVIDIA (Official)
Source
NVIDIA/skills · skills/omniverse-realtime-viewer · commit fce3cca
Licence
Apache License 2.0 (redistribution allowed)
  • LICENSE (added by AutoGineer from LICENSE-APACHE)
  • ATTRIBUTION.md (written by AutoGineer)
Synced

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