Something I would like to see in Rhino 6 is a 2 different types of layer locks in the Layer tab. 1 would be a “selection lock” which would behave much the same as the current layer lock. The other would be a “position lock” where the objects on that layer can be selected and used for various operations without the risk of accidentally dragging or moving it. Right now I constantly find myself wishing I could select an object for use (in a boolean operation, for splitting/trimming, etc.) without the worry of something moving accidentally.
There could be 2 methods of implementing this. One would be 2 separate columns of locks, one for each type, “selection” or “position” lock. Or there would be the same single lock column and the lock would be color coded (or with a tiny letter or both) to whichever state it was in. One click on the lock would set it to “selection lock”. Two clicks to “position lock”. The third click would unlock.
If this is a repeat suggestion, consider this one more vote for the feature. If this feature exists in other software that I haven’t seen or used the “theft” is unintentional. Thanks.
Thanks for the suggestion, Pascal. I’m not sure of the implication of clicking that option. Why would you need to select that? It seems that is already the default unless I’m missing something. How could you drag an object unless it’s selected?
I want to be able to select items, for various operations (i.e. splitting, trimming, boolesn, etc.) without the risk of accidentally dragging them. I work with a mix of nurbs surfaces and very dense meshes. There is sometimes a processing lag that causes “jumpy” behavior. If my mesh moves even a fraction, I am screwed if I don’t realize it moved until later on. I would like to be able to lock the position of objects and have the peace of mind to know they will never shift out of place.
Hi Doug - With that setting on, you need separate clicks to select then drag an object - you cannot do both with a click n drag, which is a frequent source of that nudging error.
Yes, this would be a handy feature to have. Today my coworker lost a full day of machining on a part that was accidentally shifted by 4mm at some point in time. It’s happened to him enough times over the years that he requested me to start a thread here on the topic, but I found this one asking the same thing.
to control this, I think. The problem I see with the locking suggestion is you’d (potentially, in crowded scenes) be constantly bombarded with the selection menu if locked objects were selection candidates, which cancels a big part of what lock helps with.
Sorry for reviving this thread (but it is Halloween soon).
I can only endorse the implementation of the above-mentioned feature. I do a lot of annotation work, where it would be very handy to have an object-based “lock coordinates/position” toggle. Currently, the Lock function prevents meshes from selection and, thus, from being useful in a scenario where a mesh needs to be selected 10-20 times a minute with the PolylineOnMesh function.
I totally understand the wish for this, but wouldn’t the exact opposite thing then also happen? Image I have a few objects that are position locked, ie. I can still select them, but not move them. So now I need to move a bunch of objects, so I select them and move them. How do I make sure that everything moved and there wasn’t some part that was still locked?
I think all this would only be feasible if we finally get an outliner where I can see layers AND their contents in the layer panel and see their lock status. Basically like you have it in literally any other 3D software except Rhino. Because then you at least have the chance to see in the Layer Panel if you have some object that is locked.
As it is right now, where the state of objects being hidden or locked is basically completely blind, I would not want to add even more complexity to it, because now there are 2 types of locked and no way at all to find out what is locked and what isn’t.
I take it the sole purpose, as stated by the OP, is still to avoid accidentally moving objects.
What do you have your Rhino Options > Mouse > Click and drag > Object drag threshold set to?
Just curious, do you expect to also change that state in the outliner or is that only for information?
Also, when you use this in any other 3D software, how many objects and layers would you say are typically in the scene?
-wim
Well, many. I don’t see why it matters how much content you have in there, that’s why things are collapsible and you organize things in layers, groups, subgroups, etc. Like in this example scene from Cinema4D:
Why would something like that not work in Rhino? Then you could see and control the visibility and lock of each object. Once again like you can do in virtually all 3D software packages… except Rhino. Or do you know of another 3D software that does not have a way to see the hierarchy of objects and some parameters about them?
I don’t know why there is always such amazement that someone might ask for this feature and the answer usually revolves around there being Rhino scenes with “literally thousands of objects”. Yes, but Rhino is not special in that and it works fine everywhere else.
I think it has to be separate since there is no strict hierarchy between layers and groups. What I mean is that 2 objects can be part of a group but be in 2 separate layers. I would rather be able to see the groups logic then necessarily what layer something is on. Incidentally, that is what they do in C4D as well, where the outliner and layers are 2 separate panels.
Then again it also wouldn’t hurt to be able to see objects in the layers panel either. Everything is there in the layers panel already and you just need to add the objects as one more level you can fold out, so it would seem silly not to have it there as well. Of course, there should be some option to enable/disable this for those that want things the old way.
It would mean finally being able to unhide and unlock objects selectively. I always thought it was strange that you have to unhide and unlock everything only to then hide most of them again. It would be nice to have a visual way of doing this.
Last point why I think it is a good idea: It actually makes it much more obvious to name your objects. You can already do it, but it serves almost no purpose. If at the moment you want to organise your scene well, you basically end up creating a layer for everything and naming those. Also moving objects to layers is always a bit strange with all the right-clicking, when you could just drag objects to a new layer instead.
I have it set, currently, to the default settings. This is because I do need to move certain objects around within my projects. Using the drag threshold as a means to circumvent the issue seems a fairly coarse solution to a situation that simply requires better object control features.
