Inline Insert - Another idea for the Canvas UI

After discovering my last UI proposal already existed, (Transplant multiple curves at once - potential for a new UI Feature?) I thought I would follow up with a second idea for a possible feature for the canvas UI.

Sometimes I find myself needing to insert a component in between two components that are already linked together. It would be great to be able to specify during insertion that the a new component so during the process of insertion so the connection process became apart of the insertion.

This could possibly work very similar to the existing practice of specifying a component to insert by doubling clicking in the canvas - only if the double click occurred on a line the UI would know that the inserted component should break the link in half and connect the ends to the respective right and left sides. When muliple nodes exist on either side there could be an additional step requiring the user to click on the node that the existing line should be connected to.

1. to begin insertion, double click on the existing line

2. Specify component to be added inline

3. New Component inserted between the two previously linked components

Id be curious to know what others think of this feature and if it is something that would help out during definition creation.

Thx.

Tyler

Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Michael Pryor on May 11, 2012 at 2:23pm

don't forget to add an option for which input / output is used :)

Permalink Reply by David Rutten on May 11, 2012 at 2:44pm

Yes, which sort of makes the whole thing quite complicated. Sometimes I can reasonably guess which inputs/outputs need to be connected, but often it's not possible.

David Rutten

david@mcneel.com

Poprad, Slovakia

Permalink Reply by Marc Syp on May 11, 2012 at 3:03pm

Yeah, I think a "swap connections" feature would be far more useful. Often I have a component whose output is being fed to 5 or 6 other components, and I'd like to replace that with the output from another component (or within the same component). If I could grab the output name and drag it to a new output without having to disconnect/rewire each individual downstream input, this would save massive amounts of time in the long haul.

With this feature, you could perform an "insert" on multiple connections at the same time.

Permalink Reply by Michael Pryor on May 11, 2012 at 3:18pm

isn't that possible with shift+ctrl+LMB? of do you mean something else?

Permalink Reply by Tyler Selby on May 11, 2012 at 4:10pm

I agree, it could quickly become quite complicated. Most of the time it seems an inline insert function would be used most often to insert components with only one connection point on each side, such as a vector direction, but I imagine it would have to work for all components to be viable for an actual UI feature for the canvas.

Perhaps the wire could become "live" again as if it were a new wire waiting to be connected as a potential solution for components with multiple connections on either the right or left side?

Permalink Reply by Mateusz Zwierzycki on May 11, 2012 at 5:25pm

math components would be easy to guess, but still not sure if I would use it... there are lots of features in all kind of software which are not used commonly, dont let grasshopper be like that :)

RSS