I will probably do this option, but I still don’t think it’s usefull, it goes with the old blender philosophy of folding things because there’s such a need for more space. You save A LOT of space with this, so you can dare to have your tools accessible.
-adds clicks at the moment you need new panels.
-I think the moment you realize you need more panels might be really inconvenient, because you need to unhide/hide the panel
-the wasted space is really small. I tested sculpt, texturing areas, usually it’s enough to have brush visible all the time + toggle all other panels on 2nd position without pinning.
Please try to use the addon for a few days, as I said before, if you want a ‘demo’ meet me on IRC #blenderpython, I believe you will be surprised how convenient it actually is.
I made the addon so that the UI works same in all areas. There’s a reason for this - if you get used to it, you will use it very fast. So, things are meant to be kept simple. I know sometimes people just burst with ideas, and it’s good to try those. but most important is, how it feels after a few days. I’ve tested many variations of how to do things also before I released the addon.
Often, addon developers try to ‘fix’ blender ui by doing things differently in their addon, but I think, this just adds more confusion. If the UI looks the same everywhere, it might feel strange first if you are used to something different. But the consistency is very important, more important than adding more features.
I just bought it, but like I said, once my setup is ok, I shouldn’t have to see the list.
There is my current setup.
The list still take some place.
Same for the properties, I activated only what I always use, don’t need to see the list again.
It’s a waste of space.
The addon must be invisible except if we always change the panels etc.
In this case, I suggest (for later if you want) to add the possibility to create panels and place operators in the panel we want to have fully customisable panels.
That can use vertical panel and in this case, we just have to chosse what we want to place on it.
That can use your list and same we place operators in part of the list.
pitiwazou, the concept here is really different from what blender has by default. you’re not supposed to see all panels you need, never. Pinning is only for cases where you need 2 panels in one moment. For what you request, possibly ‘panel hiding’ in Pie menu editor might work better.
Your setup shows scrollbars that wouldn’t disappear when the tabs would be hidden.
There should be absolutely no panel folding - this is enabled now only because some addons layouts cannot have their draw function separated in a clean way.
This doesn’t mean I won’t do the hiding for ppl who request it, I just would like the users to understand and try it out the way it was invented. I take your feedback seriously, I consider your addons very interesting and usefull.
Yes, I understant your idea, show only one part at a time by clicking on the list.
This is nice, but don’t work on each part like you said, on the properties, on the N panel etc.
This is nice, if you allows the list to be hidded it will be perfect for pined areas.
Another thing that would be useful for those working with two or more display (like me), is the possibility of having/pinning different panels for each monitor.
Right now if I open a panel in the the primary monitor, the same layout also repeats in the other screen… It would be more handy to have, for example, always open the layer manager and asset manager on a second, while I can change panels on the main one when I need.
Scigor, that’s totally right and It’s on my todo list. I now don’t know how to assign these settings to individual areas, because the scripting possibilities don’t allow that now. I am thinking about some hackish solution, but didn’t find out yet how to do it to be bulletproof… (if anybody has an idea how to do it in API, let me know )
Asmund:
Short answer :I will, definitely.
Longer one:
It is a question of what 2.8 will bring regarding UI. My wish would be they’d leave vertical tabs completely and switch to horizontal tabs+ some improvements in toolbars. It’s also possible they will invent something much better.
As far as I read the 2.8 workflow workshop results, my approach is not crossing the 2.8 ideas for UI, actually it implements some of the intended behaviours, and I intend to show it to the interface team when it’s more mature. Since really many artists react now to the addon, maybe there is a chance to get some of the behaviour directly into 2.8.
Why I did it now, when 2.8 is allready in progress? I realized that, the 2.8 project isn’t intending to solve the panel and vertical tabs behaviour so far, there are no designs for this part, and I think it might actually happen that things won’t become better. So, I don’t want to wait anymore, and I think for everybody working with blender professionally, 1 year working with better UI allready now is worth the price for which I am selling the addon…
“It is a question of what 2.8 will bring regarding UI. My wish would be they’d leave vertical tabs completely and switch to horizontal tabs+ some improvements in toolbars. I realized that, the 2.8 project isn’t intending to solve the panel and vertical tabs behaviour so far, there are no designs for this part, and I think it might actually happen that things won’t become better.”
Yes, I was hoping that they where removing the vertical tabs and made them horinzontal too. Atleast make us decide where to have the panel as the 2.8 will be more configurable than ever. I dont remember where I read this, but I remember Ton said that we will
be able to configure where we will have the buttons, but he didnt mentioned any toolbars.
Infact this addon is actually appealing to a healthier composing session too, as you dont need to twist your neck and confuse your eyes to read what tool you are working with. Also, Andrew said that “Once you used the tool, you know in your mind that it is there, the next time you will use it”. This makes more sense now too, when you now can read a horitonzal left toolbar.
When 2.8 comes out, maybe this addon can help with the button configuration, that you can use the hide/show option to drag the buttons (Like in Zbrush) and configure your own toolbar to decide where to have it, like for example as a top-toolbar and not a left-toolbar, if we are going to be able to remove butttons in 2.8.
Cant seem get it to work properly.
I cant get all panels to work at the same time!
properties works always, but either the t panel or the n panel do not populate properly. it seems that if one works the other does not. when the t panel fails, all i see are the ‘tools’ menu options, and when the n panel fails, all i see are the window options.
There is one addon that have some problems. I have to disable and enable ManualbasstioniLAB to make it show up as a horizontal text again. Do you think you can look into that?
naughtyhorse: please, are you join bruford who also wrote on blendernation? your issue is really strange, I can’t see what might be causing it - can you upload either your confing file, or the list of the addons you use? It might be some uncompatible addon or something.
pitiwazou: will look into brush texture mask. I don’t go through panels individually, I just take all of them through various ‘filters’, so I have to find those which make problems and make individual fixes. Thanks for reproting that.
Asmund: will look into ManielBasstioniLAB, oh those Addons! each developer makes something wild in the code, hard to catch all of them…
thanks for all the feedback, I am fully aware this needs some bug catching, however I wouldn’t get to it when there wouldn’t be real users, since everything seemed to work perfectly until I did the release .
just reuploaded the file on gumroad, get it from there please. I am not doing a ‘release’ yet, since I don’t want to spam all buyers before I am sure issues are really fixed.
news:
pitiwazou - texture paint panels should be good now.
go to settings - enable panel folding icon. Formating is not nice now, will fix that soon.
ldco:
thanks for the report, I think I fixed the issue.
Please re-download from gumroad and test. (and hopefully enjoy!!!)
Im just so glad someone finally adressed the vertical tabs problem.