Dark Radiant GUI proposals and questions.

[kingsal]

Hello Everyone,

I wanted to start a thread with a couple small problems, proposals, and questions I've ran into using DR. GUI stuff, in particular.

I'm sure some of these aren't new, but they might be good considerations for the people working on future releases of DR.

 

Today I'll start with the Entity Properties Menu, something I'm sure we all spend a lot of time in.

 

Entity Properties Menu

 

-Moving check boxes into a new column, just before the name (property). Currently, the check box is down below and requires you to click on the property and then toggle the button or change the 1-0 value manually.

-Moving Entity number / Primitive number and Entity Name to the top of the menu . It might be nice to see the entity's name and number in it's own dedicated place in the menu. Somewhere up top and possibly in bold.

-Show help on by default or at least have this as a preference.

-Selecting/ copying/ editing multiple properties in an entity. This would be a huge time saver. Being able to shift click and copy multiple entity properties and paste them onto another entity or delete them.

-This one is a bit more complex. Better organization of the "add property" menu. I still get a little disoriented when navigating the huge list of properties that TDM entities support. It's amazing, but cumbersome. It might be nice to organize this into more general and more specific categories. The best example is how sounds and lights have their own dedicated folders in the menu with properties specific to them. It could be great to have more organization there.

These changes could look something like this:

Edited June 9, 2016 by kingsal

[Bikerdude]

Has all of the above been tested on the latest build, 2.04..?

[kingsal]

Has all of the above been tested on the latest build, 2.04..?

 

I just started using 2.04 and yes I don't think any of these were addressed.

Even though 2.04 is awesome so far.

[Bikerdude]

Grand, just bare in mind it will be while before work is resumed on DR.

[Spooks]

Has all of the above been tested on the latest build, 2.04..?

 

Just to clarify, pretty sure kingsal is just suggesting improvements with the help of some mock-ups, not branched DR.

 

It's hard for me to come up with frontend/GUI changes to DR off the top of my head, but here's a couple.

 

• It's always annoyed me that you can't search for textures in the texture pane the same way you can in most other DR sub-windows.
• Selection Groups need to have an improved interface and perhaps a bit more flexibility. The dropdown box at the top bar of the main window does not give them enough space for their usefulness.

 

-Selecting/ copying/ editing multiple properties in an entity. This would be a huge time saver. Being able to shift click and copy multiple entity properties and paste them onto another entity or delete them.

 

FYI you can select multiple entities with a spawnarg still held in your type boxes and apply it to all of them with the checkmark button. In fact, you can type any spawnarg while multiple ents are selected, like "solid" "0" and apply that to all of them, but of course that requires memorization of spawnargs and typing them out one at a time.

 

Another way to do that suggestion is fo the entity pane not to clear when you select multiple entities of the same spawnclass.

[Dunedain19]

This was a suggestion I posted a while back concerning the cumbersome nature of the conversation editor. I have copied in my original posts.

 

At the time greebo suggested just opening another instance of DR and then switch back and forth; unfortunately, real life caught up with me and I was unable to test out that method.

 

Nevertheless, I still think that this is a GUI proposal that would be worthwhile implementing.

 

The Conversation Editor can be seriously improved by allowing the mapper to access both sound shaders and animations whilst inside the editor. Having to do this for every, single animation or shader quickly becomes an exercise in patience - especially for detailed scenes.

 

As it stands, one has to close the Conversation Editor down, manually track down either of the above elements, copy the shader/animation name, and only then return to the Conversation Editor to place the element in its correct place.

 

I really hope this can be fixed because I want to add unique dialogue to my WIP that plays alongside specific animations; as it stands, the current set-up is unfortunately frustrating and time consuming - when it could be an integrated and smooth experience that enables complex scenes to be quickly constructed and edited.

[sic]

 

The idea is that once you click either the "choose sound shader" or the "choose animation" button, you will be taken to the soundshader library or to the MD5 Animation Viewer - all without having to exit the Conversation Editor.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited July 31, 2016 by Dunedain19

[Bikerdude]

+1 on the above.

 

It would greatly increase the amount of custom conversations in mission were the mappers task more streamlined.