Hi Michael,
Just wanting to comment on the Styles behavior on opening exterior format geometry.

If I open an IGES, SAT, STEP file, the styles pane is stripped to only have what exists in the file. I can import the geometry and have my MoI styles remain. Just wondering if this is intended behavior as a way to maintain a particular files material layout? If I merly open a file, I woill need to create any styles I want to add.

I noticed it comes in as "level1", but was wondering if it could keep this and also keep the styles I have in my pane for further manipulation.

Thanks,
Burr

Hi Burr, yes the basic strategy for opening a file (of any type, whether 3DM, IGES, SAT, or STEP) is that the contents of the file replaces your current model data. So any old data gets cleared out so that only the new data is then visible.

The "model data" includes both objects and your styles list.

Import on the other hand is meant to keep your current model data and then merge the other file's data into the current data rather than replacing it. So you can use Import instead of Open if you want to keep your current styles list in place and only add to it rather then replace it.


One thing I've though some about though is maybe having another menu item under the Style tools dropdown (the menu that pops out from the arrow on the Styles header in the scene browser) that said something like "Add default styles", which you could hit to pull in the default set of styles (either the regular default, or the ones from the template file if a template has been set up)... Does that sound like it would help for this situation?

- Michael

Hi Burr, also one other thing - currently if you do a File/Import and pick a 3DM file that has no objects in it and only styles, the styles do not actually get imported. They only get imported if there was at least one object also in the file.

But I've fixed this up for the next beta so that if you do a File/Import on a file with no objects in it and only style set up, that the styles will come in.

- Michael

This will provide a way to get a preset stylelist. Thanks.

So currently, If I do the export to iges with default style, then bring it back in with the open commnd, the only style is "level1"...But if I import, it is assigned to the Default Style. So if I open the iges, and have a style of level1, then I import my MoI "Styles Template" to populate my styles browser, will I have a remaining "level1" or will it switch to default again?

I seem to like the idea of having the opened models assignments be something recognizable like "level1" but also realize that creating duplicate style entries would cause a problem also.

Thanks for the time...

Hi Burr,

> So if I open the iges, and have a style of level1, then
> I import my MoI "Styles Template" to populate my styles
> browser, will I have a remaining "level1" or will it switch
> to default again?

Currently you'll have a remaining "level1" object.

Right now the library that is used for IGES, STEP, and SAT I/O does not support storing or reading back the names associated with a style/layer type entry.

In IGES the semi-equivalent of layers are called "levels", so that's where that level1, level2, etc... comes from. When there is not a name stored there is just a number to go by when reading the file back in.

But is there some particular reason why you would be saving and loading back your objects from iges format instead of saving in 3DM format? 3DM will work better for this since the names will be preserved.

- Michael

It's mostly in association with working with my CAM package. It likes IGES and STEP better than 3dm. So when I work with my brother, we go back and forth with these other formats... But it really isnt an issue for me. For the most part, I just go one way with the models, I was just engaging the dialogue. The loss of all the Pre-populated styles seemed a bit "out" with MoI's less-as-more target. The ability to re-populate a default list is just an addition I thought could be useful.

Hard to find anything you havnt been considering already :O