Preview of Preview Dialog features.

[optigon]

One major change I've been working towards finishing is a group of features that will let user see the updates to models that are made through dialogs.

For instance when you are in the middle of an op and press [Tab] to bring up the Numeric Entry Dialog, you will now be able to see the model change as you type new values. That is the main feature, anyway.

Another useful deployment of this feature set comes when creating a new primitive, such as a Torus. Changing the shape parameters updates the model automatically. This way you can see what the model will look like before hitting OK.

To complement this new feature I've also made some changes to the dialog ui.

• Numeric text entries and sliders can be adjusted using the mouse wheel.
• When using the mouse wheel to adjust numeric or slider values, Constraints via the [Ctrl], [Shift], and [Alt] are supported.
• 3 Preview Modes are available:
  • Auto - Updates the model as values are changed.
  • Delayed - Updates the model after a short period of no changes.
  • Manual - Updates the model when you press the Update button.
    
• Basic Camera operations can be used to observe the model from different angles. The camera is active using your default mouse and key combos when focused over the model space. Camera does not work when focus over the dialog. Axis alignment and other options from the view menu are not supported.
  

I've ported the changes to as many tools as I could see as benefiting from these changes including:

• Selection tool dialogs
• Primitives creation dialogs
• Numeric dialogs called during drag sequences
• Absolute Commands
  

I think these new features will be really useful in all aspect of using Wings.

Additionally, I am currently making changes to a few of the Primitives; combining their dialogs into basic shapes. So far I've combined the Cube and N-Cube into a new Cube dialog, and I finish the new Torus dialog today combining the Lumpy and Spiral tori into a single dialog. Currently I'm trying to combine all the cylinder varriants. The result should be a more dynamic primitive creation process and a shorter menu.

Here's an image of the new Torus dialog. You can see the new Preview options on the right side of the dialog. The torus in the image is the preview of the settings shown.