<<Re: ShrinkTrimmedSrf

Well, the difficult thing with stuff like this is not the command itself, but rather how to integrate it into the UI.>>


Hi Michael,

First, I'd like to reiterate that I highly value and appreciate your primary goal
to keep MoI's UI, simple but highly effective and user-friendly.
It's one of the things that I find so innovative and appealing about MoI.

Having said that, I think that as designers new to NURBS gain
experience and see the potential for more sophisticated surfacing techniques,
and as more and more Rhino users finding themselves preferring to be in the MoI modeling
environment, we can anticipate a need for some of the less frequently used surface editing
tools that we're familiar with from Rhino such as ShrinkTrimmedSrf, " surface matching for tangency"
and probably several other features that you've invented or will invent, :-)

So what I'm trying to say is, the problem of where to put them, will call for a solution.
I use a few keyboard shortcuts in Rhino, but they're for tools that I use regularly...
I don't know about anyone else, but unless I see or frequently use a tool, I can forget it's there...
so if it doesn't have some kind of presence on the interface to remind me once in a while, I forget to use it.,
I find myself not even using aliases and tools that are exclusively keyboard activated..
If you want to keep MoI as an entry level CAD program and also have it be useful to more experienced users,
perhaps you can have a "basic" mode with the default workspace that looks and functions as the MoI we
are now familiar with, but then as new tools are developed and implemented you could add in the option
to turn on an "advanced mode" with tabs that would stay folded
up when not being used...or flyout menus for a 2nd tier of advanced tools, or like in Rhino, a pop-up middle
mouse button that you can customize with an assortment of tools on a floating toolbar that will
dock in place or else just stay open on a temporary basis.

Maybe even implement the option to turn on a very thin and unobtrusive top menu bar like Rhino has, for the advanced mode which
can be accessed with the mouse or by the keyboard? ex. (alt +F, then another letter for a particular function)
I don't know really.... everyone has their preferences and I'm just kind of thinking out loud, here. :-) The thing is, I really like the simplicity
of MoI's "look and feel" !

-Jesse