RhinoWIP for Mac: Updated 3DConnexion library

[dan]

Hi All-

In the latest RhinoWIP for Mac (V9), we have updated the 3DConnexion library used behind-the-scenes. You may notice that the 3DConnexion panel has disappeared from the app Settings menu. This is because the new library ought to work better with the drivers provided by 3DConnexion themselves…and Rhino should pay attention to the settings there.

These changes just made it in the latest WIP and testing has been minimal so far, so we would love your help. I can already see a couple features are missing - Rhino commands and icons - but others may not be working as expected, so please report them there.

-Dan

[Rhino_Bulgaria (Bobi)]

Any chance that the stock Rhino 9 will support SpacePilot (a discontinued device that does not work with Rhino 6.4 or later), or at least remain the option to replace the driver with the one from Rhino 5 as a workaround? This is what makes it possible to use SpacePilot with Rhino 7 and Rhino 8. I’m asking, because I plan to upgrade to Rhino 9 and being able to work with my SpacePilot is essential.

SpaceMouse Pro device(approximately 13yrs old) rotates fine in R7 not R8

The support for my SpacePilot suddenly ended with Rhino 6.4 (earlier Rhino 6 versions came with a 3d mouse plug-in from Rhino 5), so I’m using an older plug-in with my Rhino 7 and everything works flawlessly. The only downside is that I have to repeat the process of replacing the plug-in every time I update Rhino 7, but that takes just a minute. I use this plug-in together with 3DxWare64_v10-3-0_r2161: 3dxrhino.rhp (444.2 KB)

[dan]

@Rhino_Bulgaria

Any chance that the stock Rhino 9 will support SpacePilot

I’m not sure. Please test it with the latest RhinoWIP and see what happens.

[Rhino_Bulgaria (Bobi)]

I have Rhino 7, therefore I can’t try the latest Rhino 9 WIP. Is there some stripped-down version of Rhino 9 WIP with disabled saving and all tools, just to test how the SpacePilot will behave with it?

[Akash]

Hi @dan
Testing here with the Enterprise device.
all the buttons that are mapped via macros in 3DConn to rhino hotkeys still works fine .
but the navigation knob stopped working with this change in the WIP.

until now it always needed one button mapped to a rhino command directly [via the rhino option panel]. here it was the FIT button mapped to the zoom extent command.

Now i don’t know how to get the navigation to work…? Can you please explain how to do that now.

thanks a lot
akash

[dan]

@Akash

but the navigation knob stopped working with this change in the WIP.

Odd. I’m testing with the SpaceMouse Enterprise too. I’m curious what version of 3DxWare you have installed. You can find this in System Settings > 3Dconnexion > Tools (tab). I’m using 10.8.8 (3856):

@Akash

here it was the FIT button mapped to the zoom extent command.

Ah yes, I forgot to log that. I’ll get that on the list.

[dan]

@Rhino_Bulgaria

Is there some stripped-down version of Rhino 9 WIP with disabled saving and all tools, just to test how the SpacePilot will behave with it?

No, unfortunately not.

I will reach out to 3DConnexion and see what sort of backward compatibility they have with older devices (if any). Do you have a link to the exact model version of the SpacePilot you have?

[Rhino_Bulgaria (Bobi)]

This particular model of SpacePilot is a discontinued device, whose support was purposely ended as a form of planned obsolescence. When Rhino 6.4 was introduced, the “3dconnexion” company provided a new driver which excluded SpacePilot from the supported models. According to their website, the last day of support for SpacePilot was on 31.03.2019.

It has the best “cap” hardware across all their devices, which is even superior to their latest models, featuring a near zero dead zone. The new models have a noticeable dead zone and stiffer spring, which, combined together, cause a more difficult navigation in Rhino’s viewport. I tried numerous new models of the company and they were unbearable for my liking. After trying my SpacePilot, a few people who had the newer models were convinced to buy used SpacePilot from Ebay.

One particular specific of that model is that it works best with USB 2.0 ports. For some reason, sometimes it may not “like” USB 3.0 ports, which I believe is caused by the higher power they provide.

3Dconnexion discontinued devices • 3Dconnexion UK

NeweggBusiness - 3Dconnexion SpacePilot 133031000 Black/Silver 21+...

3Dconnexion SpacePilot - Modern Driver Compatibility (Preview)

[rudolf.neumerkel (Rudi)]

Yeaaaaahhhhhhhhhhhh, finally

However, the new navigation modes do not work yet on my machine for some reason… will experiment a bit.

Thanks for the effort from your side!!!

[dale (Dale Fugier)]

@Rhino_Bulgaria

Any chance that the stock Rhino 9 will support SpacePilot

This is a question for 3dConnexion, not us…

Support for Discontinued 3Dconnexion Devices [McNeel Wiki]

[Rhino_Bulgaria (Bobi)]

I’m pretty sure that the support of Rhino 9 for SpacePilot will be perfect should “McNeel” decide to add an option to choose between a default driver (latest one provided by “3dconnexion”) and a legacy driver from Rhino 5. The latter is literally what I use in my Rhino 7, but it adds a bit of inconvenience as I’m forced to replace the stock driver after every update of Rhino. If it was a simple option inside Rhino, that would make the process a lot smoother.

[Akash]

Yes i was on older drivers [which were fine until now]. So updated the drivers. now navigation is working but in a weird way. totally un usable.

With all the lack of options [that were available for Window users] Navigation was always perfect [ever since the base version [the R5Mac]

So how to please, get it to behave normally? [don’t know how to define it… Just the way it was until yesterday.]

[dan]

@rudolf.neumerkel

However, the new navigation modes do not work yet on my machine for some reason… will experiment a bit.

@Akash

now navigation is working but in a weird way. totally un usable.

As I experiment more, I think Target Camera mode is working…kinda. However, I do think the plugin is not yet determining the correct Rotation center at all. So, to be more clear, here is what I think is not working:

Using basically the same settings as @Akash above (except with Lock Horizon enabled), I am able to navigate somewhat, except that the Rotation center appears to keep moving. Is that what you guys are experiencing with Modelmodel: set to Object?

(I’m having to recalibrate my expectations based on the 3Dconnexion Home’s Trainer applet, btw.)

[Akash]

It seems also the axis are reversed now….. [a problem many window users had in the past but was never an issue on Mac]. It’s too bothersome and confusing to revers each one manually…. they really should to be right [Natural] on default, as it was up to now.

I’d love to know what the Lock Horizon and Dominant options suppose to do / be useful for? [we didn’t have these before on Mac]

And also the rotation center marker is not visible.

thanks for working on this @dan

For now, perhaps consider giving us back the old way as a temp option. Until the major usability bugs are sorted….. Because now as it is, i can’t use the WIP for anything at all.

Edit: added a macro in 3Dconnexion for the FIT button to do _Zoom _All _Extents. and it now works [it was needed also to make FIT work in R8 with the updated drivers that no longer link to the rhino setting panel

[dan]

Thanks for these bug reports. I’ll get them logged soon!

@Akash

For now, perhaps consider giving us back the old way as a temp option. Until the major usability bugs are sorted….. Because now as it is, i can’t use the WIP for anything at all.

We will consider this. It may take up more time to support both than actually fixing the bugs themselves. In the meantime, make sure you keep last week’s WIP (9.0.25210.12306) around for good measure.

[Akash]

@dan

We will consider this. It may take up more time to support both than actually fixing the bugs

Then better leave it …. the request came from thinking it’s a matter of just keeping what was there before, But if there’s a conflict and extra work, it’s not necessary [for me at least, as i still work only in R8]

BTY: what about offering users a pre_mapped [optimized] default setting ? then users if the want to can modify to their particular needs.

It was like this with the [now old] Zbrush when it was still an independent and free [upgrades] …. users asked for a 3Dconnexion support for years. and then when it came it was perfectly preconfigured. all the buttons worked, the default choices were very good, a delight .

Especially for the viewports buttons. the same setting should be right for most users .

[seltzdesign (Armin Seltz)]

Not sure if it’s similar for Windows, but in our office we use SpaceMouse without the crappy 3DxWare. Rhino has a built in driver and so does other software we use it with. 3DxWare’s automatic switching of which application is “focused” is really bad in my memory. For example whenever you switch to a browser all of a sudden the SpaceMouse controls the browser and no longer Rhino. In our own software it was giving us a lot of problems, so we discovered that just not using 3DxWare at all was the best solution, since Rhino already has the driver built in.

Does this mean you will remove your own driver from Rhino 9 for Windows as well? I sincerely hope you leave it in as an option at least!

[Akash]

Hi Dan. @dan

Would it be possible please to prioritize getting the axis setting for up, down, in, and out, to be the same as in R8…?

This will at least make the WIP useable.

Right now, setting these axis to work in the correct direction manually for the WIP makes R8 un-usable .

Perhaps it is possible to assign a separate setting profile to the WIP [in 3Dconnextion settings] [?] But … with so many things to double map, it’s tiresome and things can [do] easily get messed up.

[LewnWorx]

@dan

Having just loaded the WIP I can verify Akash’s findings above. Up / down / in / out all broken (at least not matching R8, and actually the rotates and spins are as well and any changes I try to make to the settings in WIP (I have a separate entry for the WIP in the 3dCOnnexion app list for this reason) actually affects Rhino 8 although not constantly. Just spent the last 3 hours playing “axis Whackamole” between R8 and the R9 WIP.

What’s goofy as hell is this “new” flavor “sorta” almost works, i.e. Right/Left/In/Out/Up/Down no longer need to be remapped to work.

To be clear though “work” for me means when I push down I zoom in and when I pull up I zoom out.

When I move up I push away, when I move down I pull towards.

The easiest way to explain that would be if the puck was stuck to your display:

down zooms in (goes into screen)

up zooms out (goes away from screen)

panning the view up and down with the puck stuck to the screen then makes total sense -

pushing away (when it’s on desk) is actually panning up when it’s stuck to screen,
pulling towards (when it’s on desk) is actually panning down when it’s stuck to screen.

This was the way the 3dConnexxion guy explained how to use it at a trade show all those eons ago when I got my first one and has been how I’ve used it ever since.

It now appears that 3DConnexxion is using that assignment metaphor as I can use the defaults for all axises (up / down / right / left / in / out) and they do what I’ve always (at least on a Mac) had to manually swap (in all apps, and still do, except with Rhino being the sole one using the “default” settings I’ve never used before.

so while that works?

The rotates are all screwed up in the WIP, and I’ve had to totally jack with the rolls and turns to get those to work correctly (and they used to always work correctly).

And for those (spins tilts etc) the other apps (fusion / auto cad / Prusaslicer etc) all use the default settings for the non axis stuff and work fine as they always have.

It’s like this new driver version inverted what was broke in R8, and trying to have both up just wrecks havoc on R8 even though I’m changing the values in the “added” app for the WIP, as it’s affecting both, but NOT in the same way and I just can’t get it to stabilize to get both apps to work correctly, ergo the whackamole.

The bottom line is a decade +’s worth of muscle memory is not gonna get overwritten easily (I’ve tried previously, just doesn’t work for me) so I need both 8 & 9 to at least behave the SAME way to be usable.

[Rhino_Bulgaria (Bobi)]

Have you tried the solution mentioned in the 2nd post above?

RhinoWIP for Mac: Updated 3DConnexion library

Any chance that the stock Rhino 9 will support SpacePilot (a discontinued device that does not work with Rhino 6.4 or later), or at least remain the option to replace the driver with the one from Rhino 5 as a workaround? This is what makes it possible to use SpacePilot with Rhino 7 and Rhino 8. I’m asking, because I plan to upgrade to Rhino 9 and being able to work with my SpacePilot is essential.