CompuServe Thread

WOULD YOU LIKE SEE AND TRY OUT A NEW USER INTERFACE FOR VISUAL MODEL? Then read on. First of all, let me congratulate Visual Software for the great images that can be rendered in "Renderize Live". The rendering speed is excellent, but … There is always a `but'. The Visual Model interface is not what I had hoped for. I myself am a software engineer, and I have developed several Microsoft Windows applications, so I feel I have a good working knowledge of how GUI's (Graphical User Interface) can be designed. Now before I go too far, I recognize that the software is still young. I am a beta tester for Microsoft, and Corel, and I have seen applications go through these early stages, and know what it is like to develop a robust application. It takes time, and feedback from the customers to improve their product. Well, this is just that type of feedback. It seems Nick Josephs is very open to suggestions, and this is a welcome change. I have spoken with Robert Birch (the salesman that helped me make the decision to purchase the Visual Reality Suite of tools), and he has explained they are working on a new release. For all I know, everything I am about to mention/suggest has been implemented. As a programmer myself, the best way to get my point across was to PROGRAM a GUI, so that is just what I did. It is kind of a WISH list you can look at. Not to toot my own horn, but it only took one night to create the example. I feel it gives a good example of how "Most" windows applications work. I say "most" only because it uses conventions set out by Microsoft's VC++, an object oriented programming language. The toolbars and status bars are similar to Word, Excel, CorelDraw 5.0, etc… I have uploaded the example to this section's library (first the forum sysop must to decide to add it to the library though). I hope this will open up a dialog on how we (the customers) would like the next version of Visual Model (or VR in general) to look, and act. I am not affiliated with Visual Software in any way, and this should only be used an as example, it's kind of my personal "Wish List" if you will. If you can't find a copy in the library, I would be willing to send it to anyone interested via E-Mail. The file is a self extracting archive. Just copy it into the directory where you want the files to be extracted to, then run it. This is a full fledged working application, minus the drawing capabilities. I am not about to try and figure out all of the geometry involved in 3D modeling, nor do I know the format for DXF or SHP files, that is why Visual Software exists. They are the 3D rendering Gurus, not me. 🙂 ________________________________________________________ Here is a description of what my Visual Model GUI looks and acts like: ******************************************************** Smaller toolbar. (we don't need the text descriptions as ANOTHER button below the graphical button). As you select the toolbar buttons (or even scroll through the pulldown menus) you will see a description of that function in the status bar at the bottom of the screen. Try it out. The toolbar always shows you what drawing tool is active. In the current version of Visual Model I would sometimes get lost as to what I was doing. The status bar also shows the state of the SHIFT key, CTRL key and ALT key in lower right corner. Status bar shows X,Y,Z coordinates. Toolbar is fixed, it doesn't change between 3 different sets of buttons. (Popup menus, and popup toolbars are used for the tools you don't see in the toolbar. For an example read the next paragraph.) * The `Points' or `Objects' menu selections can be accessed while drawing in the viewport, by clicking the right mouse button!!!!!! I felt it was annoying to have to select a point, then move the mouse up to the toolbar to select `Closest Point'. Why not just click in the viewport, then use the right mouse button to open up a floating toolbar that gives access to these selections. In my example, use the right mouse button to activate the "Palette" (or use the Palette menu). This palette only represents the `Points' options, but could be expanded for the objects as well. Ability to turn off toolbar and status bar, you can try this out, Enable/Disable from the View menu. When working with drawing programs, screen real-estate is at a premium. Dialog boxes use a more common interface. Try selecting "Change View…", from the View menu, or "Preferences…" from File menu. You will notice the check boxes for the preferences dialog reflect the current selections. For some reason the current version of Visual Model uses buttons, and they don't stay in the state at which you last selected them. In addition, the current version of Visual Model uses a thin font that is hard to read at times, and sometimes the characters get chopped off. Context sensitive help. By selecting Help, or using the Arrow/Question mark icon, you can get help on any toolbar item, or menu item. This example does not have all of the help indexes, but some will work. Give it a try to see how it works (i.e. get help on "Edit-Cut" or "Edit-Paste", etc.. these do work). Added "Refresh View" command. Even the best windows application can sometimes lose track of the screen updates. This will redraw the entire screen if the screen gets garbled up. Added "Zoom/View All Objects" command in View menu. This would Zoom the view out to display all of the objects in the 3D work space. I like the way renderize live has this option (Renderize actually moves you out so that you can see the camera, but it would be nice to have something similar in VM.) This selection does nothing, but serves as yet another WISH. Sometimes you get lost in 3D space and you would like to find out where some of your objects have vanished to. Added "Arrange All" selection in View menu. The current Visual Model will draw the TOP and SIDE views OFF the screen when working in 800×600 display mode. How do you get these back into the screens client area if you can't select the status bar with your mouse? You can't as far as I can tell. This function would cascade the views onto the screens client area. File Menu includes MRU's (Most recently used files). Go ahead and try it out. Load in a Visual Model file (*.shp or *.dxf). The Main window text will show the name of the file you have loaded. Exit my example, then run it again. The last file you loaded should be added to the "File" menu. Select "About" from the Help menu. It will give you a general idea of how much memory and free resources you have. When your percentages or disk space is low, it acts as a good way to warn a user of impending doom. *** Those are all of my example suggestions. I hope they are taken as a positive criticism, and not somebody whining, I hate whiners too, after all, I am a programmer too. 🙂 ("You want the software to do WHAT now!") —————————————————- —————————————————- Getting away from my example, I have run across some bugs, and have a few questions. Here are a list of problems/bugs in the current version of Visual Model that I am running (1.0). Any ideas on the cause? I have a very stable computer. I have 16 megs of memory, and never have problems with any other application, and I have run and tested ALOT of applications on this system without problems (unless of course they are one of the programs I am beta testing). * windows do not always update (they don't repaint when parts of the window are clipped). noticed mostly when panning or rotating. * Locks up (aaaaargggggghhhh). * GPF's in unknown modules. *Received a "Floating Point Error" * When loading STADIUM.DXF from CD-ROM clip-art it locks up. By the way, why are there .3DS files on the CD-ROM when the manuals for VM and Renderize don't say they support them? Just curious. *The yellow square that shows which object is selected doesn't always surround the object. If you zoom or pan it seems to get lost. i.e., the object will be in the middle of the screen, but the yellow square will be on the right of the screen. I known it is not a screen update problem, because if I select the ghosty yellow selector, the object (on the other side of the screen) moves. Yikes, my PC is haunted!! HELP!!!! Robert Birch assured me this was a stable application, and I have a 3D rendering project I need to finish for one of my clients. I need to model an airplane that my client is going into production on, and I need a certain amount of accuracy and reliability. I can't afford to reset my computer every 10 minutes… ………reset my computer every 10 minutes ……… reset my computer every 10 minutes ……… reset my computer every 10 minutes ……… reset my computer every 10 minutes ……… reset my computer every 10 minutes ……… Please note, these are all related to Visual Model. Renderize Live on the other hand seems to get the job done, and I have enjoyed working with it. Thank you in advance for any feedback, Jeff Steinmetz Urge Productions & Technologies CompuserveID: 74741,2006 Internet: jeffsteinm@aol.com