I am proud to announce release of my new addon,
the tabs interface addon.
Get it here!
Please, if you want to discuss the addon, do so after trying it for a few hours.
I am not really interested in theoretical talk about UI concepts,
I want to know if this is a good way to go for blender professional users,
and if I should spend more of my time in developing better UI for blender.
Note that this is ‘only’ a python addon, which takes whole panels UI and changes it, so my possibilities in extending it’s functionality are now limited, and there might be bugs in drawing some of the panels.
If you wonder why I am selling the addon - I want to get support for my (hard) work and many hours spent on it. It is of course open source and you can get it also for free if you really want to.
If I’m not mistaken this was in someone’s UI proposal a few years ago. It looked esthetically different (which is still important for cognitive reasons) but functioned the same. I think it’s a great quality of life improvement to panels. I don’t have access to Blender right now so can’t try it out. Can I shift-select to view multiple panels at the same time?
It was my proposal :). Back then, I didn’t realize I could do it with python. Visual side is limited by what blender’s layout scripting can do. You can’t shift select( which is a good idea btw, but I don’t know how to do that now), but you can pin the panels, which is basically the same. Each panel has a pin in the header.
Great work Pildanovak!
This script really came together nicely, and i’m looking forward to seeing you improve it further (icons for the modifiers, better location for hide/unhide icon, etc)
After using the script i found it made me work faster and have more controle over the interface. I dont have to have a big window for the properties panel anymore, it now fits in a Much smaller space, leaving room for other panels
Thank you so very much! This is possibly the best $7 Ive ever spendt. It worth alot more, I know the amount of work for this. I tried to write my own script that worked this way, but it was all copy/paste from other scipts so I never understood Python succesfully, so thanks for healing my pain Suggestions: Do you think its possible to add the “Add modifier” button to the “tools” shelf too? This would be like:
Quality of life change If I have few pinned tabs and I’m selecting non pinned category it should appear top part of the scroll list not down to the bottom as it is now since this addon was clearly made for lessen scrolling this is must have change of feature. Also unlocking tabs and dragging them to reorient their location in pinned position would be nice too. Cheers its way better than current vanilla ui which is horribly scroll fest in endless nightmare.
edit: it seems that almost all uv map addons like smart uv doesn’t work with this, for now I’m very sad because I can’t live without my other addons :,(
Thanks everybody for great support, feedback, and purchases!
I can see at least part of blender community thinks about UI in a similar way as I do.
Regarding disfunctional Addons - it’s due to various things addon developers do, and I’ll try to see what I can do. Best first step is to write here for me, which addons don’t work for you, and I’ll try to change the addon to work with them. I so far managed to run currently all addons I have here, so there was no way for me to find out.
Possibly the ‘disabling’ function for certain panels is a good idea.
Of course, these fixes will come soon. I just was so happy with the addon I couldn’t wait to release it.
Åsmund: Thanks for support! I know what you mean with modifiers, because it’s on my mind too. I currently don’t have any new panels in the addon, except for a simple replacement for transform panel - however I am thinking about directions to go. Re-defining many panels can be a huge undertaking, which I wouldn’t be able to do as 1 person, so I have to choose the targets with a ‘broader’ view of things.
My problem is that nothing works at all. All tabs disapeared and now I have a blank empty pannels. So, I guess, it is not due to a specific addon that is problematic. How can you help me with that?
Have you test it on v.278.4?
hi dezet, sometimes, you need to click in the UI for the tabs to appear for the first time. Did you do that?
The reason is, I basically take all Blender UI, and need to re-register it after it’s been allready registered, I didn’t want to take a lot from blenders performance, so it doesn’t update immediately. It should work, please test it. I work with 2.78 and tested the addon also with 2.77.
Hi dezet, the link you specified doesn’t work for me I am definitely interested in fixing this asap .
Maybe it’s some other addon interfering.
As soon as I see your console output, I can do something about it.
Haha, great! Glad you got around to coding it in Python. A C++ implementation would be ideal though. I’d like to know Julian’s opinion on this. Is there any way I can tag him?
the problem is, I can’t find a way to break it here. Also on blendernation people report blank interface.
I enabled ALL addons in blender release at once, here’s how it looks > I would really like to get same bug as other people here…
Maybe if you enable the addon, save settings, and restart blender, does it still happen?
Suggestions: Do you think its possible to add the “Add modifier” button to the “tools” shelf too? This would be like:
I am definitely interested in fixing this asap .
I would really like to get same bug as other people here…