Hi Val, in the future at some point I may be able to try some alternative selection methods, but it's a pretty complicated area to deal with. Just popping up a huge list of things is not really a very friendly mechanism either.

For now really you are best off with hiding objects that are getting in your way of selecting things. If you do want to hide most of the object but leave some structure of the object in place, then you can do that by selecting all of the object's faces (select 1 face first and then do a Ctrl+A) and then hide them, that will leave the edges of the object to still be displayed but let you pick through it.

Using that method you can set up individual objects into a wireframe type mode.

- Michael

Hi Val, also here is a script you can set up on a shortcut key to make it a bit easier to set an object to "wireframe mode":

script: /* Set selected object to wireframe */ var breps = moi.geometryDatabase.getSelectedObjects().getBreps(); for ( var i = 0; i < breps.length; ++i ) breps.item(i).getFaces().setProperty( 'hidden', true ); moi.ui.redrawViewports();

To set this up, go to Options> Shortcut keys, and add in a new entry. Put in whatever you want for the key to trigger it, like maybe W for wireframe, and for the command part paste in the above.

Then with that in place, you can select some objects, and push W to hide their faces and leave their edges showing, turning just those objects into wireframe mode.

When you want to see the whole object again later, just use Edit > Hide to show the hidden faces.

- Michael

Dont forget when in the show hidden lines mode, you can use Ctrl+Shift to window select objects through the transparency.

Here's an alternate version of the previous script - this one sets the selected objects to "wireframe" (faces hidden) mode, and also locks the object as well:

script: /* Set selected object to wireframe and lock it */ var breps = moi.geometryDatabase.getSelectedObjects().getBreps(); for ( var i = 0; i < breps.length; ++i ) { breps.item(i).getFaces().setProperty( 'hidden', true ); breps.item(i).locked = true; } moi.ui.redrawViewports();

- Michael

Wow, thanks!! I will go testing you suggestions.

Val

BurrMan,

That didn't work, is there certain situations where it will work?

Michael, Does MoI V.1 have Ctrl+Shift for selection disable?

Hi Burr, MoI v1 does also have the Ctrl+Shift for forcing window selection.

Val - maybe it wasn't quite clear from the description exactly what that does. Normally it's when you click in an empty area that you trigger the window selection mechanism.

But if you are zoomed a ways on a model, there can possibly be no empty area available. The screen may be totally full of stuff and if you click and drag on an area of the screen that is not empty where there is an object there, it will move that object around rather than doing a window select.

However, if you hold down Ctrl+Shift it will force window selection to happen no matter where you clicked, even if it was not on an empty area.

So you can use that to make window selections in areas where they would otherwise be difficult.

- Michael

wait, isn't that the same as Shift+Right Click?

Hi Val,

> wait, isn't that the same as Shift+Right Click?

No, there isn't anything special for Shift + Right Click - that's the same as just a regular Right click with nothing added.

Right click is used for a couple of different things - when in a command doing a Right click is a shortcut for pushing the "Done" button. When you're not in a command doing a Right click will repeat the last command.


There is another option for window select though, which is if you hold down just the Ctrl key when doing a window select, that makes it a deselection window rather than a selection window.

- Michael