I would vote for something similar to the very first post (and similar to the scene tree in C4d).
I also like the idea of a "scene tree" button to collapse the panel if you don't need it.

This would be quite clear to use for anyone coming from many Cad or 3d soft. backgrounds, but also for novices.


Please don't do cryptic buttons à la Lightwave, one of Moi's strengths so far has been its clarity.


One thing related to the scene management: it would be important to be able to export each group as a seperate group or object,
and to be able to read imported 3dm objects correctly grouped, per material or per layers.


Also it would be good to have a command to lock a layer, to make it visible but not selectable,
and an option to turn on\off snapping to locked layers.