Please help... I must be missing something pretty basic. I hope.

I've tried adding trim points, joining the curves, even changing the offset piece to a different orientation. Blend fails in all cases.

What am I doing wrong?

Hi Garet, you've got some curve objects that are sitting right on the same spot as the surface edges - you will need to select those curves (which probably were used to trim the surface) and either delete or hide them to get them out of the way since they are preventing you from selecting the surface edges.

If you deselect everything and then move your mouse over those edge areas you'll see that you can select the curves there and then delete them. Or you can hide them using the Scene Browser, go to the Types section in the scene browser and then if you click on the eye icon next to the entry for "Curves" it will hide all curve objects.

Also the edges are broken up into a couple of different segments, you'll probably need to select those and run the Merge command on them to combine them together into a single longer edge before you do the Blend:
http://moi3d.com/2.0/docs/moi_command_reference10.htm#merge

I've attached a version where I've done both of those things so it's ready to blend.

- Michael

That's brilliant! Thank you!

It's these kinds of housekeeping things I really need to get a grip on.

Thanks again!

Hi Garet, yeah in cases where they're going to be getting in your way it tends to be good to get in the habit of either hiding or deleting the original construction curves right after you are done with whatever construction you were doing with them.

In the future this is an area that I'd like to tune up somehow, maybe by trying to put up some kind of selection popup that says something like "Curve or edge?" in this kind of situation where there is a separate curve and edge stacked on top of each other. It's a tricky thing to get working nicely though since it is one general goal of MoI to not annoy you a lot by popping up dialogs right in your face all the time...

- Michael

I dont personally care for the selection popup like in Rhino, where a popup of 3 polysurfaces, 4 curves and 6 edges is presented. I like the current mechanism of curves having priority. I can easily mouse around to find curves to manage...

I guess it's a matter of understanding of the way that works, and how that will be handled for training/learning MoI. Maybe shortcuts, or a means for placing the cursor in the different selection modes, for those wanting to work in that type of way would be less intrusive on the current system?

Hi Burr,

> I dont personally care for the selection popup like in Rhino, where a popup
> of 3 polysurfaces, 4 curves and 6 edges is presented.

Yeah I had a major goal for MoI really early on in its development to eliminate that. I had set that up originally in Rhino but it's one of the areas that I later on viewed as problematic since it's very disruptive and is popping up on you so frequently. Part of what makes MoI pleasant to use is removing these kinds of constant "in your face" interruptions when you're working on stuff.

It's a good example of an area where I've learned from previous design mistakes from creating Rhino and made improvements in some of the essential areas like how selection works.

But there is still a usability problem in this particular area of having difficulty selecting edges when curves are on top of them, and with beginners just not being aware of how that particular situation works.


> I can easily mouse around to find curves to manage...

Yeah I would not want to really too fundamentally change how this works, I'd still want to have curves given priority and have mousing around work the same as currently, just maybe something like when you actually click on a spot that has both a curve and an edge right on top of each other some kind of small panel could open up that says something like Curve / Edge with curve being highlighted but you could then click on the word "Edge" to select the edge instead or you could just leave it be and do nothing extra. The tricky part is that when a beginner sees this thing saying "Curve or Edge" or "Curve / Edge" or whatever pop up, does it actually give them any clue as to what is really going on or would it just be another source of confusion...


> I guess it's a matter of understanding of the way that works, and how that will be handled for training/learning MoI.

Yup right now this is how this particular issue is dealt with - that it's just something that you have to learn about. But it's definitely one of the main remaining areas of confusion for people starting out using MoI.


> Maybe shortcuts, or a means for placing the cursor in the different selection modes,
> for those wanting to work in that type of way would be less intrusive on the
> current system?

The problem is that these only help out people who fully understand the issue, and once someone understands it they can already solve it with other means already like just hiding the curves...

These methods of a shortcut or different modes would probably not help someone who is starting out, since they wouldn't know about the shortcuts or modes just like they don't know about the curve and edges being different things and the curves being stacked on the edges in the first place.

- Michael

Would it be feasible to have these helper popups for newbies and those that like them, yet be able to switch them off under Options if they get in the way?

They might actually be a comfort for those people used to working with them on other systems.

Martin (2).

Martin - I've had the same thought before. My idea was to have a "Hints" pop-up system that can be turned off in Options.

Brief Hints would pop-up anytime an action failed and also contain a link to the on-line manual section for more info:

Blend = Make sure you've selected edges, not curves. Make sure edges are not broken into segments.

Fillet = Make sure edges are joined. Try a smaller fillet value.

Planar = Make sure edges are planar.

Etc....

There are several things you just have to know to be proficient with MoI and I think a Hints option would reduce the learning curve. It would take some time to implement, but probably save more time by not answering as many forum questions.

Probably the forum regulars would be willing to write the hints as a group.

Ed

Hi Martin,

> Would it be feasible to have these helper popups for newbies and those that like them, yet
> be able to switch them off under Options if they get in the way?

That's certainly one possibility. But it would also be good if it was "low profile" enough that it would not actually get in the way to start with...

- Michael

Hi ed, yeah I want to eventually figure out some area of the UI where I can put a variety of informative messages, not just for errors like that but also some commands might be able to report useful information about how many things they've processed or things like that.

So far I have not really figured out a particularly good way to fit that into the UI while maintaining the streamlined nature of it though.

- Michael