nice topic.
comment on UI
what i really think is a great quality of rhino:
- commands are accessible by
- icon in toolbar
- via the menu
- via the commandline
- via shortcuts / aliases
- rhino allows both verb-noun, and reversed noun-verb approach (first tell the programm what to do, then what is affected / and reveresed) (the hole adobe creative suit is noun-verb-only !!)
- commands / options can be customized / fine tuend / automated by macros, scripts, Plug-ins, … really cool.
commands i could live without
i use 90% of the commands written in the command line.
so i really don t care if some older commands pile up…
what i really love is, that for most commands the naming / taxonomy is precise.
But there is also some commands, my non-native-language-brain fights:
weld-merge-stich
ring-loop
extract-duplicate
crv-curve
i could live without: _boolean2Objects, gridSnap, before SubD: Gumball,
meta-Commands / command-search
I think some commands could be combined into a single meta-command.
A good example for a very complex command that exists is _arc
_extrudeAnything would be a metaCommand combining 10 different extrude Commands.
_rotate and _rotate3d might be easily combined.
and of course a general:
_SurfaceByCurvesEdgesAxis
_sweep1 adding an Axis will become railrevolfe
_sweep1 adding a rail will become sweep2
_sweep2 adding a 3rd rail will become networks…
_revolve adding a rail will becom railrevolve…
another approach would be to find commands by a advanced search
input is … (curves, axis, surface, …)
action is … (modification of shape, translation, modification of UI, modification of properties…)
output is … (surface, information as text in commandline, …)
the UI should have an answer on how to find commands that might help, but the user does not know.
pay and vote feature
i would love to be able to dedicate my Rhino7 to Rhino8 upgrade payment on some features. If this is possible i will pay the upgrade tomorrow, even if the new version needs 3 more years to come. I would love to set my money on
- a nurbs based multiblend tool (most)
- some homogenisation of workflows of similar commands (_box , _extrude - direction)
- input-finetuning / mouse focus (when does a field needs a enter to confirm the command, when do i need to click the viewport, where is the delete key dedicated to)
- a commuity - developer meeting, drink a bear with pascal and the others ;- )
- have a version switch in the online help, including older versions - google still finds V5 at first place.
and i will tell my university / school to put the money on:
- exactly the same interface on mac and pc.
- including preferences, layouts, UI-Customization
- a simple approach to share all preferences and UI-Customization between computers, mac and pc - i would love to share “tom-s-setting.xml” to all students at the beginning of a course. “drag selected objects only - yes”, no “near” object snap, “turn of automatic points on”, …
i don’t car about a fancy UI - but it woudl be a pity if all tutorials and videos would not be compatible with a new Version.
looking forward to see V8 - the code editor already is great - kind regards - tom