Hi Geo,

> if i have been ungenerous, i apologize.

No worries, if you're having problems getting stuff done, it's good for me to hear about it. That's how I can improve things in the future!

Re: Move and Rotate - this seems to be a pretty common sticking point.

Actually you shouldn't normally need to use Move that frequently. Instead of explicitly using Transform/Move, instead just click and drag on an object while you are not inside of any command (push the cancel button or hit the Esc key to get out of a command), and you can move it around that way.

Move is still provided in addition to the drag to provide for some precision movement options, like moving one object by an exact distance specified by snapping between some points on other existing objects.

Rotate is more convoluted than you want for a similar purpose - to provide the ability to get an accurate rotation snapped on to existing points. That's why there are a few clicks in there, each one gives you the chance to snap on to some existing points in the model. Here is an example: http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=156.3 .

To rotate something, select it and then run Transform / Rotate. Now you will pick 3 points to define the rotation. The first point is the center of rotation. The second point creates kind of an arm that comes out from the center of rotation. The location of this "arm" will be 0 degrees rotation. The third point creates a second "arm" coming out from the center of rotation and the angle between the 2 arms is the angle of rotation. Frequently you may want to shoot the first arm straight out to the right, then the second arm will track an angle starting with 0 to the right which is pretty straightforward. If you know the angle you want to rotate, you can skip doing any arms and just type in that angle number after you pick the center of rotation.

Since I wanted to make it possible to do accurate modeling with MoI, some of the stuff in it has this type of "accuracy-focused" tools, that's what is probably gumming you up the most. I want to augment these in the future with an additional more casual type of rotation and sizing tools, like some kind of grip frame around an object that you could grab to rotate or scale more quickly. But that won't be ready for the initial 1.0 version of MoI.

Let me know if you get stuck on any more of these things, I can give you some more details on how rotate works with some screenshots if you are still stuck.

- Michael