Hi PaQ,

> About the size info, isn't the lower tab from the MoI
> interface a better area to show this kind of stuff ? somewhere
> close to this

There isn't really any room left down in there for something wide like that - on a 1024x768, or also even a 1280x1024 screen with large fonts, that bottom row is pretty much full right now already.

Eventually I will probably need to do something about this, and have things like some optional controls that only appear when you have more room down there on your particular screen (a user editable toolbar where you could drag and drop buttons to could work well for this). But so far I have tried to avoid doing that and have attempted to have just one UI that works with all screens right now.


> For me the upper right place is a really important place
> in MoI, where every tools options are showed, and I think
> the size info is not something really 'primary'.

That properties stuff I showed in that upper-right area only shows up when you are not in a command, and therefore have no command options being displayed. It's pretty much the main blank area that I have to leverage that works on all screen resolutions.

Just like it shows the "tools options" for the active tool, think of it as showing the "objects options" for the currently selected object when you are in selection mode before starting a command.

Anyway that's the other logic behind having the stuff that can change depending on what is selected (which includes size readout) all be in one location there.



> Will style include shade mode (wireframe, solid, solid + wireframe
> etc), transparency, specular etc etc ? ...

Eventually yes, but probably not for v2.


> I mean is it some kind of surface editor that also include dx
> shader like for example world image reflection, toon shader, etc.

It won't have that kind of an editor in it yet - think of it more as an overall mechanism and area of the UI that will hold such things when they are added in the future.

Those will become additional tabs on the left side, to control those additional properties.

Then a "Style" is a bundle of all those possible properties, so that you can set up a kind of property template and apply numerous properties (all relating to visual display) in just one click.


I'm thinking that probably there will also be a "Styles" section in the scene browser tree view thing as well, which hopefully can use the same mechanism for groups for hiding / showing / selecting objects that all have a particular style easily.


> A thumbnail system that will show the style look would
> be sexy too (if I really understand what styles are)

Yup, I would like to do that eventually, like show a small curve or cube or something in there instead of just a color swatch. For v2 I think it will just be a plain swatch though.

- Michael

Looking good Michael.
Really looking forward to the next beta. :)

Thanks a lot to take some of your time to reply us :)

Just waiting patiently the next beta !

Hi PaQ,

> Thanks a lot to take some of your time to reply us :)

No problem! It actually can help me to answer questions, etc... It helps to clarify whether what I'm doing makes any sense or not! :) (let me know if it doesn't make sense!)

I was originally going to try to jam some kinds of tabs or things to hold a bunch of different properties directly inside that upper-right area. But this new method is going to "scale up" to hold more stuff in the future a lot better while also keeping that top-level UI streamlined and simple.

- Michael

Looking good so far....

1) Will object browser / scene tree be within the same panel / area ?

2) I think units labels makes seance if they where somewhere close as PaQ mentioned.
Thought will it be more comfortable to the eye, intuitive if they on the top right corner ?...

Hi yannada,

> 1) Will object browser / scene tree be within the same panel / area ?

I think that is going to be an additional full size docked panel to the left of the current side pane, something like what was discussed here:
http://moi3d.com/forum/index.php?webtag=MOI&msg=1944.1

- Michael

Okay Michael, I'm gonna jump out on a limb here...

Constraints. We already have them to a certain extent. I can limit tools to certain distances/angles already. But, what about preserving those distances/angles?

I have no idea how the GUI would represent a constraint, but, seems like the toolset is there already, just need a way to preserve the constraints as we continue working.

Hi TwinSnakes,

> I have no idea how the GUI would represent a constraint,
> but, seems like the toolset is there already, just need a way
> to preserve the constraints as we continue working.

Constraints are kind of a whole different area of stuff.

Normally a constraint-based program will represent them in the GUI by things like dimension lines, and let you click on the dimensions to change the values and recalculate the shape.

The recalculation can involve quite a lot of detailed stuff like extending certain parts, sliding other parts over, maintaining other constraints at the same time, etc... That involves a constraint solver and that solver part is not something that I have already available. That kind of solver mechanism is a lot different than being able to specify a line length while you draw, when you change the line length in the solver, the solver will make a lot of changes to other pieces of the drawing in addition to the line that was just edited.

I do expect to have a deeper history and parameter editing function in MoI which would let you do things like edit the control points of one of the original curves you drew and then update the model to reflect the changes (this already works to a certain degree) but that is a pretty separate thing from constraints.

I don't really expect to have constraints in MoI for the foreseeable future, that's something that you will need to use a system like SolidWorks, SolidEdge, Pro/E, etc... for that kind of workflow.

- Michael

Thanks for all the replies, Michael.

It sounds really good ... I look forward (as always) to the next beta.

cheers
eric

The next beta will be launch next week ( I wish :) )

Like, say, 9am, 17 Nov, Ausie Adelaide Time!

Brian
(9.30 is ok!)

I got a method set up for editing the size now...




You can put in expressions like 22/5 in there, and also use a + or - sign at the start to make a relative change in size.

- Michael

COOL, thank you sir...

Looks very impressive... :)

How about this :

Hi Michael...

Take a look at this video just for your inspirations...

this last one video is more for "polygon" box modeler ;)

Hi Michael,
since you can enter +2.5 on Z (whence you had 5); would it be possible to incorporate on any given dimension f(d); where f is a function (+, -, *, /) and d is the dimensional value of X, Y, or, Z? This would allow to generate some geometries with proportions; for instance X could be 2*Z. The difficulty for at least a novice user would be to avoid creating a circular relationship.

Cheers,

- Diego -

>>this last one video is more for "polygon" box modeler ;)

Is called Instant3D in Solidworks, It’s an answer to Spaceclaim, CoCreate, Synchronous Technology in Solid Edge and NX, etc. "SketchUp on Steroids" as Deelip Menezes said.

Synchronous Technology is very cool tech which Siemens built on top of the Parasolid. (SolidWorks also is based on Parasolid Kernel) http://www.plm.automation.siemens.com/en_us/campaigns/breakthrough/

http://www.evanyares.com/the-cad-industry/2008/5/21/synchronous-technology-and-design-freedom.html

http://www.synchronoustechnology.net/blog/54/editing-imported-models-the-easy-way/ COOOOOOOOOOL

Hi Anis -

> How to change 3D model directly from 5 to 7mm

This new system will also allow you edit the size of a sub-object like an edge or a face, like this:



I'll probably also be tweaking that a bit, to show length for a line and radius for a circle, rather than x,y,z bounding information for those particular kinds of objects.


But this new system is for setting the size of the entire object, it will not do "constraint" based type operations that may extend and alter interior regions of a shape differently than the shape as a whole.

That kind of interior part modifying requires a lot different kind of mechanism behind it which I don't expect to have incorporated into MoI anytime soon. For that you should use one of those "direct manipulation" style modeling systems instead, like SpaceClaim, Siemens NX, Kubotek, etc... Or it also sounds like there is some new stuff available in SolidWorks for that as well? At any rate, if you need to do those kinds of operations those other modeling systems will be the proper tool for that kind of a job, not MoI.

Just keep in mind that MoI is not particularly focused on being a complete replacement for one of those kinds of modeling systems. If the things you need to do are solved very well already by one of those other systems, then I generally expect that you should use them for that task and not MoI.

- Michael