A new v2 beta (version Jun-23-2009) is now available for download here: http://moi3d.com/beta.htm

You will need to enter your v1 license key to download the v2 beta.

The v2 beta installs into its own folder, it is not a problem to have v1 and any v2 beta installed on the same machine, in fact I recommend that so that you can fall back to v1 if you run into some temporary bad bug in v2.


A lot of progress on the Scene browser and Styles for this build.


Probably the biggest thing is that now style assignments are written as materials to OBJ and LWO files, and also object names too. This should help in several ways to make it easier to export data to rendering programs and have it all set up.


Release notes:


Updated OBJ export - export styles and object names to OBJ files.

Styles become material assignments, with the colors stored in the associated .mtl file (the creation of the companion .mtl file can be disabled under Options > Import/Export > OBJ options / Write .mtl file).

Object names in Moi become the names used for the corresponding mesh object in the OBJ file, and if you have several objects with the same name assigned, those will be merged together into a one mesh object in the OBJ file.


Updated LWO export - similar to the above, styles in MoI become surface assignments in the LWO file, and object names will be transferred as the labels for mesh layers. If you have several objects of the same name, they will be combined together into one mesh layer with that name.


Updated the Edit/Hide button to simplify basic use and provide an additional Isolate function.

To hide objects, select them and left-click Hide.

To show all objects, click Hide with no selection.

To isolate the current selection (hide everything else other than what is selected), right-click on Edit/Hide. This will remember the state of objects right before the isolate, and when you right-click on the button a second time the previous state will be restored.

To show only a subset of the hidden objects (rather than showing all), you can hold down Ctrl and click on the Edit/Hide button. This will temporarily show all hidden objects and allow you to select some of them. Then when you hit Done or right-click, only those selected objects will be shown and the other ones you did not select will go back to being hidden. This is called "Show subset".



New Lock/unlock functionality.

Objects can be locked by holding down Ctrl in the scene browser when clicking on an eye (it will turn to a small lock instead), or by using the new Edit/Lock button in the side pane.

When objects are locked, it prevents them from being selected but keeps them visible in the scene for either a visual or snapping reference. Snapping points to locked objects can be controlled by a new option in Options > Snaps > Object snap options > Snap to locked objects.

By default when objects are locked, they switch to a grayed out color. It's possible to disable the color switch or adjust the color used by the switch with new options under Options > View > Locked objects use alternate color. Uncheck the checkbox to avoid color switching, or click the swatch to adjust the color.

The new Lock button in the Edit palette in the side pane works the same as the Hide button next to it:

Left-click on Lock with objects selected to lock all objects.

Left-click on Lock with nothing selected to unlock all objects.

Right-click on Lock to "Isolate" the current selection by locking everything else other than the current selection. Right click again later on to restore back to the pre-isolate state.

Ctrl+Left-click to do an "Unlock subset" which will show all current locked objects and allow you to select just a few of them to unlock. Then when you hit Done or right-click, the ones you did not pick will go back to their previous state.



Update generated sub-object styles - newly created sub-objects of a solid (for example fillet surfaces) will now get assigned the style of the parent solid rather than getting the active style applied to them.

Updated how styles are assigned to generated objects. Generated objects are objects that are created from input curves, for example an extrusion or sweep. By default these objects will now inherit their styles from their input curves. So for example if you have a curve that has been assigned Style = Red, when you extrude it, you will get a solid that is also assigned Style = Red. This can be changed so that instead of inheriting the input curve's styles, the active style will be applied to the generated objects instead. To change this, switch this setting in moi.ini:
[Styles]
GeneratedObjectsInheritStyle=n
Or it can be toggled back and forth with a keyboard shortcut:
script:moi.geometryDatabase.generatedObjectsInheritStyle = !moi.geometryDatabase.generatedObjectsInheritStyle;


Added a new "Opposite" configuration option for the scene browser, under Options > General > Scene browser position


Updated the visuals for the scene browser section headers.


Updated scene browser selection action (clicking on the text of an entry in the scene browser). The selection action will only target shown objects and skip hidden ones if you hold down shift. This can be reversed so that the default is to skip hidden ones by this setting in moi.ini:
[Scene Browser]
SelectSkipHiddenObjectsDefault=y


Selection undo has been extended to also work with hiding, locking, and all scene browser actions. So for example if you did something with the scene browser and realize that you have shown or selected something that you don't want, hit undo right then and you will go back to the previous lock, hide, and selection state. This only works for one action, so that it does not clog up the regular geometry undo.


Updated assignment of styles by clicking on a swatch. Now if all objects currently assigned to a style are hidden or locked, then when assigning objects to that style by clicking on a scene browser swatch, those objects will be hidden or locked so that the style retains the same status as it previously had. This should make this part of assigning objects to existing styles feel a bit more like how layers usually work.


Undo now works for undoing object property changes, like editing a name or a style of an object.


Make styles work properly with Copy/Paste - previously copying between 2 instances of MoI would not bring styles back and forth which is now fixed, and also copying between MoI and Rhino will now only transfer the styles that are used by the objects being copied rather than the full style table.


Undo now works to undo edits to the style table with the Edit styles dialog (after the dialog has been closed). Previously style assignments could get messed up when doing an object undo after editing styles.


Added a new tools menu on the Styles scene browser item, so that it is possible to access the "Add new style" or "Edit styles" functions more easily.


Updated IGES import/export to support transfer of IGES levels back and forth to MoI styles. This also applies in some cases to SAT and STEP format as well.


Updated object selection, so that solids that have their faces hidden and only edges showing can now be selected, previously if faces of a solid were hidden, the solid would not select when you clicked on edges.


Updated 3DM export to store object names so they are accessible to Rhino in saved 3DM files.


Updated 3DM import to enable opening of basic geometry from Rhino v5 files.


Added .getStartPt() and .getEndPt() script methods on a curve so a script can retreive the starting and ending points of a curve.


Added in selection of named objects by typing the object name in the coordinate entry box, hit the Tab key to place focus in that field. Wildcards can also be used, so for example if you have objects named obj1, obj2, and obj3, you can select them all by typing in obj* .


Added an option in moi.ini to persist the last used mesh settings between sessions:
[Mesh Export]
PersistSettingsBetweenSessions=y


Added an option in moi.ini to disable the numeric input flyouts (that normally pop up when clicking on a numeric field):
[UI]
DisableNumericInputFlyout=n


Update Tab to work when a numeric flyout is open. Previously if a flyout was open (for example if you have clicked on the Angle field in the Meshing options dialog), you coudl type in numbers or push enter but Tab would not do anything - now Tab can be used in this situation with the flyout open to move to the next field, committing any value if you had entered something.


Added .cameraFrame and .targetFrame scriptable properties to viewports, to enable being able to set the construction plane to the view's viewplane with a keyboard shortcut script like this:
script:moi.view.setCPlane( moi.ui.mainWindow.viewpanel.getViewport('3D').targetFrame );


Updated the rendering of display meshes to make a better quality display with less z-fighting for objects that are a fairly large distance away from the origin.


Reduced initial working set by about 10MB by purging stuff that was only used at startup but not for regular running after startup.


Added new Merge command. There is no button for this but it can be launched by typing in the command name or assigning it to a shortcut key. Currently this can merge together edge that are tangent where they touch each other into longer combined edges.


Updated Trim so that you can use the Del key to act the same as right-click or Done to exit after picking pieces to discard.


Received and integrated bug fixes to the geometry library which fix these surface/surface intersection bugs reported on the forum by PaQ and Ella:
http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=2518.1
http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=2608.1
The boolean failures reported in these posts are fixed now.


Updated curve joining tolerance to work the same as surface edge joining tolerance.


Updated Rotate, Rotate Axis, and Edit frame wheel mode rotate to have an additional radial intersection snap that creates an implicit circle through the first picked reference point so that you can more easily rotate an object to the point that it collides with other nearby geometry. For example:



Added a new "cap ends" option that is now available when offsetting an open curve. Example:



Updated Edit/Add pt to enable mid point snaps, either when adding a point to a control point hull or when adding knots to a line segment.


Added a scriptable option for drawing hidden lines with no shading. This can be used in combination with the view capture script for making a different style capture:
script:var v = moi.ui.getActiveViewport(); if ( v != null ) { moi.view.lineWidth = 4; moi.view.shadeMode = 'HiddenLineWireframe'; v.renderToClipboard( 2560, 2560 ); moi.view.lineWidth = 1; moi.view.shadeMode = 'Shaded'; }

Or it can be toggled on or off during regular working with this:
script:moi.view.shadeMode = (moi.view.shadeMode == 'HiddenLineWireframe' ? 'Shaded' : 'HiddenLineWireframe');
For an example see:
http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=1049.28


Added a .getLength() method to curves so scripts can determine the arc length of a curve. For example this script will copy the length of the selected curves to the clipboard:
script:var crvs = moi.geometryDatabase.getSelectedObjects().getCurves(); var len = 0.0; for ( var i = 0; i < crvs.length; ++i ) len += crvs.item(i).getLength(); moi.copyTextToClipboard( len );


Added a checkbox option for switching rotate to middle mouse button like SketchUp, under Options> View > Rotate/Pan/Zoom options > Rotate with middle button checkbox.


Updated keyboard shortcuts so that number keys or the minus (-) key can be used as keyboard shortcuts if you wish. If you set them as a keyboard shortcut, then your shortcut will be executed when those keys are typed rather than the numbers automatically going to the first available numeric input field.


Fixed a crash in curve trimming in a case with trimming a closed curve with a very small sized cutting object.


Fixed a couple different meshing crashes.


Implemented curve transform proxies - this speeds up the dynamic mouse feedback for transforming a large number of curves.


Updated ArrayCurve with a new "Align to surface" option. If the curve is on a surface you can push this button and pick the surface, and the surface normals will be used to keep the object oriented to the surface normal as it travels along the curve path.


Update object properties with history recalculations - make object properties like name and style assignment persist through history updates. Previously when you did a history update any names or styles that were assigned to the object being updated would be lost.


Added option to choose beween either Modo or LightWave style vertex normals when writing a LWO file, under Options > Import/Export > LWO options > Vertex normals style.


Updated history - suppress saving history data on a few commands (Join, Separate) that don't work with history updating anyway and can possibly bloat the file size up by a large amount.


Added a script function that can be used to remove history data from selected objects:
script:moi.geometryDatabase.getSelectedObjects().callMethod( 'deleteHistoryData' );


Updated scroll wheel zoom - it is now possible to hold down Ctrl while spinning the scroll wheel to make it go in a smaller increment, and also it will not slide the target point forward in this mode. This can help if you are trying to zoom in close to a small sized detail.


Updated File/Export to only write out styles that are used by the selected objects that are being exported rather than all styles.


Updated Boolean difference - when selecting cutting objects there is a new "Keep objects" checkbox which you can set if you want the cutting objects to remain in the model rather than being deleted.


Also various other small bug fixes and tune ups.


Please let me know if you have any problems!


- Michael

And cool Browser can be on the Opposite side :)
Claude Nicolas Ledoux would have liked that! http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Claude_Nicolas_Ledoux

Some Notes to translate :)

Once more a stack of good stuff in this beta. I'll looking forward to working with it.

But I'll need to download again as looks like you added the 'opposite' option after I already got it and before the announcement :-)

Woh! There's a whole bunch of stuff, and good stuff at that, good going Michael!

Just one thing I couldn't get to work, that's the 'Rotate with middle button' option, when selecting this option, the middle, as well as the RMB pan only, in 3D view, no rotation at all, that's here on a vista laptop, I haven't tested on another PC, I'll keep you updated when I do.

Cheers
~Danny~

I've been waiting for this for a LOOooong tyme!

Thanks Michael!

-Will

Styles (material assignments) for OBJ output is the feature I was waiting for. Works very well with Hypershot and will save me a lot of time.

Sorry if I may have missed this, but is there a way to save my Style (color) definitions so they appear when I open a new session of MoI?

Ed

Hi Michael!,

...still involved in MoI development...stay tuned to my comments and wishes :)

Considering this three states of Types part of browser...








...I think the ctrl+right click on Lock (or right click on Eye) icon of locked / hidden / partially hidden item should unlock / show all but "active" (it means the item adjacent to the icon under the cursor) - for example (see first image), currently there is no difference between ctrl+left and ctrl+right on Lock icon of Curves item. It result in unlocking curves. I would prefer the ctrl+right click led to unlocking all types but curves.

Note, that it also applies to Styles items.

Petr

>>> Sorry if I may have missed this, but is there a way to save my Style (color) definitions so they appear when I open a new session of MoI?


You can save them in an empty file and use the file as a template (Options > General > Template file)

I was unaware of the Template File option - Thanks!

Ed

I'm very interested on a way to mesh Rhino NURBS objects and bring back the meshes at the right layers. Could be there a chance to get something for it? Maybe an option could be implemented that allow to save styles as mesh names (without joining meshes with the same name) and at Rhino a script move the meshes back to the original layers?
Michael, if you like to get v2 ready now, maybe it's something for a v2.1 later. ;)

Hi Micha, re: mesh Rhino NURBS and bring back into Rhino with the same layers.

> Maybe an option could be implemented that allow to
> save styles as mesh names (without joining meshes
> with the same name) and at Rhino a script move the
> meshes back to the original layers?

I think it should be possible to handle this part by a script right now in MoI.

For example, if you set up the following script on a keyboard shortcut:

script: /* Set object name as style name + num */ var objs = moi.geometryDatabase.getObjects(); var styles = moi.geometryDatabase.getObjectStyles(); for ( var i = 0; i < objs.length; ++i ) { var obj = objs.item(i); obj.name = styles.item(obj.styleIndex).name + '_' + i; }

Then when you hit that shortcut key each object will get assigned a name of its associated style name, plus a unique increasing number, like BlueLayer_2, BlueLayer_3, etc...

The number is appended to make the names unique to avoid combination of mesh objects with identical names.

After you have run that script, then when you export to OBJ and read into Rhino, that information of what layer the mesh was originally on will stored in the object name, and some Rhino script code should probably be able to go through the meshes, strip off the ending _xxx which will then give it the layer name to place that object on.

Probably if you can clearly state the problem in the Rhino newsgroup someone will be able to help you with that part. Something like: "I have a bunch of mesh objects with layers stored in their names, like BlueLayer_1, BlueLayer_2, OrangeLayer_5, etc... and I want to edit these objects to place them on the layer that is named in the object name, like assign BlueLayer_1 to the layer named "BlueLayer", etc...


You can incorporate that same MoI script above to be a built in part of your batch conversion script if you want, just after the opening of the model file. Here is more readable version of it for putting in a text file rather than in a single-line keyboard shortcut:

// Set object names to be their Style name + unique number.
var objs = moi.geometryDatabase.getObjects();
var styles = moi.geometryDatabase.getObjectStyles();
for ( var i = 0; i < objs.length; ++i )
{
       var obj = objs.item(i);
       obj.name = styles.item(obj.styleIndex).name + '_' + i;
}

- Michael

Hi Danny,

> Just one thing I couldn't get to work, that's the 'Rotate with
> middle button' option, when selecting this option, the middle,
> as well as the RMB pan only, in 3D view, no rotation at all,

Thanks for reporting this - it looks like that's a bug when the 3D view is set to be parallel rather than perspective.

That's probably a lingering bug where some things had assumed that a parallel view was always an ortho-plan one, since in MoI v1 that was the case.

It should be easy to tune up, I'll take a look.

- Michael

Michael, I just had to chime back in and say that MoI is an absolute pleasure to work with now that I can assign my surfaces and have them xfer over to my other apps!

I'm also loving the browser and how I can select, hide and show things - hella powerful compared to v1, it just all ties in so nicely now having the browser along with the surface assignment features.

At one point I was thinking to myself that it felt like I was working in Silo or a polygon modeler but with the pleasure of NURBS!



The only thing I was sorely missing at this point and I'd be really nice if you could get a solution in there is a headlight for the 3D view.

Spinning and selecting surfaces at times was hard because they'd fall into darkness. I know you've posted scripts to change the light direction and I'll have to look those up, especially now, but a constant light direction while spinning my objects would keep the comfort level for me on a level high.



At one point, I was also wishing for an additional selection mode.

I had an object that I had assigned globally to a surface name. But then I wanted to take just a few of the shared surfaces and assign them to yet another surface.


At first I tried to select just parts of the assembly using the right to left selection method but that would select the whole object.

Now having the ability to intricately assign surfaces, I was looking for a way to be able to quickly select only what's touched while going left to right and not the whole object.


I ultimately had to break apart the object and using the right to left selection method, it was easier to select the larger surfaces and hide them leaving the smaller surfaces to reassign to the new surface defnition then join everything back together...


I think what would be really helpful is a way to select surfaces that cursor touches - I guess like a paint selection mode. Of course the opposite should be available - hold down [ctrl] and deselect whatever the cursor brushes across...



-Will

Hi Will - I'm glad the surface assignments and scene browser are working
well for you! Hopefully that will save time.

Quick note re: headlight - yeah you can actually have a pointing-straight-forward
headlight in MoI if you want, if you set up a keyboard shortcut.

To do that, go to Options / Shortcut keys and add in a new entry. For the key
put in whatever you want, but maybe L would be a good choice to be short
for Light. Or whatever you will remember.

Then for the command part, paste in the following:

script:/* Toggle between headlight and regular light directions */ var dir = moi.view.lightDirection; if ( dir.x == 1 && dir.y == 1 && dir.z == -1 ) { dir.set(0,1,0); } else { dir.set(1,1,-1); } moi.view.lightDirection = dir;

Then when you hit L you should have your headlight set up.

- Michael

I was just thinking of that last night. Good one.

The script copier utility for this release.

You can download and run the attached ScriptCopier_Jun_23_2009.exe program, which will copy custom added scripts from your MoI v1 installation to the new beta's installation folder.

- Michael

Hi Petr, it's great to hear from you, you've been away from the forum for a long time!

I'm not exactly sure if I'm following what you are talking about for Ctrl+Right-click though...

You wrote:
> for example (see first image), currently there is no
> difference between ctrl+left and ctrl+right on Lock
> icon of Curves item.

There will be a difference between them when you do a second ctrl+right click though. That will unlock everything because that is meant as an "exit from isolate".


> I would prefer the ctrl+right click led to unlocking
> all types but curves.

If I understand correctly though, that is sort of the opposite of what right-click is meant to do.

Right-click (either with Ctrl or not) is meant as an "isolate" function - which means that it will "activate" (either show if no Ctrl, or unlock if Ctrl is held) the item you clicked on and "deactivate" (either hide if no Ctrl or lock if Ctrl is held) everything else. If that item was already active, then it will activate everything, which allows for a kind of "exit from isolate" on a second click.

In the case that you are talking about, all the other items happen to already be locked when your item is isolated, so yes that does not have any difference between Ctrl+Left or Ctrl+Right, but that's the same behavior as regular right-click without Ctrl.

For example if you have all styles hidden and you now right-click on one of them, just that one will turn on which happens to be the same as if you left-clicked for that case since everything else is already in the state that isolates that object.


If you want to get all things unlocked except for curves, the way you can do that is to Ctrl+right-click on curves until all things are unlocked which may take 2 clicks depending on your starting state, then use Ctrl+Left click to lock the curves item that you are on.


Basically the right-click set of actions whether Ctrl is down or not are meant to either activate the current item, or to re-activate all items. So in either case it is going to be activating that current item and not de-activating it. The method that you are talking about would be like deactivating that item rather than "isolating" it as the only active item...


Maybe this will make a little more sense: populate the styles section with all eyes. Now hold down Ctrl and right-click on one of them. You'll see here that everything else other than what you clicked on will become locked - that's the "isolate lock" - the item you picked is now the only unlocked one and everything else is locked. When you are done working on that isolated item, you can then repeat the same click on it and everything else will be activated again.



Please let me know if this does not make sense though, it's a fairly subtle area and maybe I did not understand what you were getting at.

- Michael

Hi Petr, also here is an illustration of how the right-click is set up, this may be clearer.

So in the following I am right-clicking on some items without Ctrl down. As you can see this produces an "isolate" of the item that is clicked on where it becomes the only active (visible) item and all other things deactivated (hidden). Then notice the final click - if you right-click on an item that is already isolated, everything will reset:



So now here I am repeating the same sequence but instead holding down Ctrl. You can see that the action is the same, except it applies Unlocked / Locked as what is meant by Activated / Deactivated:



So that's basically what the right-click is mean for, either with Ctrl or not, Ctrl just applies it as locking/unlocking things rather than hiding/showing. But the basic mechanism to "isolate" the item being clicked is the same.

- Michael

Hi Michael,

>> Please let me know if this does not make sense though, it's a fairly subtle area

No, it does perfect sense! Basically, it is exactly the same behaviour like for batch processing of snap menu, isn't it? I think you understood me very well. What I was talking about was related to the case and only the case in which ALL items are locked or hidden or locked&hidden. But I can see it now. It would make things somewhat complicated. Like you wrote- ""right-click (either with Ctrl or not) "activate" (either show if no Ctrl, or unlock if Ctrl is held) the item you clicked on and "deactivate" (either hide if no Ctrl or lock if Ctrl is held) everything else. If that item was already active, then it will activate everything"". -It means that only the state of item being clicked is taken into account and not the state of other items when deciding whether making the isolation or "exiting from isolate".


>> If you want to get all things unlocked except for curves,
>> the way you can do that is to Ctrl+right-click on curves until
>> all things are unlocked which may take 2 clicks depending on your
>> starting state, then use Ctrl+Left click to lock the curves item that you are on.

Basically yes. Except the state of curve(s) created after setting "starting state" - they will be locked after all. In the case I was talking about that I would prefer there will be both locked and unlocked curves (and unlocked everything else).

Petr

Hi Petr,

> Basically, it is exactly the same behaviour like for batch
> processing of snap menu, isn't it?

Yup, it's meant to follow that same model.

The nice thing about that model is that it kind of serves 2 purposes with the same mechanism - one is to make that isolate function to be able to get to that "only show this one category" state with just a single click (like in the screencap above).

Then the other use is just as a general shortcut for displaying all things - if you have a mixed state with some things on and some things off, you can do 2 right-clicks on any item to show them all.

Yeah, I hesitate to make additional behavior for other cases... If it gets too complicated with different behavior for special cases it will probably get more difficult to use in a natural way.


> It means that only the state of item being clicked is
> taken into account and not the state of other items when
> deciding whether making the isolation or "exiting from isolate".

What it actually does for this, is that it always first tries to isolate the item, but it keeps track of what was done in order to get to the isolated state.

If there were no changes performed during the isolation, then it knows that item was already isolated and it will do the "exit from isolate" operation instead.

So the state of other objects is actually taken into account though, since the process of isolating an object does mean to deactivate other objects. When all other objects were already deactivated, that's when "exit from isolate" happens.


There is also now a slightly different kind of isolate available by right-click on the Edit/Hide or Edit/Lock buttons on the side pane rather than in the Scene browser. Those isolates actually store a snapshot of the state of all objects when you perform the isolate (which in this case is targeted by selection rather than by style or type as in the scene browser), so that when you exit it the previous state, including mixtures of some hidden, some visible, etc... is restored rather than having all things turned on as with the scene browser one.


- Michael