Automatically patching dragged actors
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Hi,
I have the feeling that auto-connecting can be a bit dangerous ( in "live patching" ).One feature I would really love since years, is that if you try to connect a wire to a pin accepting only one input ( like video ), and if the data type is valid, the new wire should be connected in place of the old one.Mehdi -
...and while we're talking about patching practicalities, I'd love it if the LimitScale Value actor had the Value input at the top of the list, rather than the bottom. I keep getting caught out....
John -
the problem of your wish is, Isadora handles everything from left to right from top to bottom. Also each actor starts executing from top to bottom. For the limit value actor the definition has to be read before the value, thats why it would not work in this example. Sure Mark could programm the actor that it would work the other way but then you never know how each actor is doing this process.
Best Michel
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With any amount of functionality (from simply linking video throughput actors, to more sophisticated ways of selectable in/out connection wires/pins) the implementation of this feature would put Isadora on par with how it is done in other node based software. Right click on an existing wire to search, select and insert an actor inline would deliver a speed boost to development time, as would drag and drop actor additions via mouse hover and drop over wires/pins. The data types - video, 1/0, string, numeric etc. might start to provide some intuitive way that auto matching in/out connection at the pins might work.
And what about color coding connection wires based on type?Regards,bonemap -
@dbini I have solved this issue by wrapping the actor into user actors for a couple use cases. Helps me with the output min/max being reset with new input range values.. very handy.
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@bonemap I would love to have more visual elements included in the ui. Colored cords are one. Marking user actors in some way is another. A visual indicator as to which inputs have an init value set... And many more Please when ever you have an idea like this, add it as a feature request... With a centralized collection of ideas we can more easily arrange them into a design / road map.
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I think the UI, colours and other 'sexy' ideas have been on the cards for a while. BUT: I feel for Mark because he always gets isadora to a great place version wise and then something major happens to Quicktime, an OS or a new technology develops that needs support so the (arguably) smaller 'sexier' things have to sit on the back burner for a while.
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Hi @Skulpture,
The thought about colored wires is not the aesthetic look of a patch. It is to enhance the understanding of how a patch is working. By providing depth to the visual cognition of what different species of data are doing across the representation of the visual programming environment. I would not see value in it otherwise.I appreciate your sentiment and I hear you. It is also my humble opinion that the rock solid stability of the tool should always be the utmost priority.Isadora rocks at the moment! (except for a few niggling things here and there)Cheers,bonemap -
I agree. Isadora V2 is awesome, and it's only getting better.
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Sorry--went away from Isadoraland--back again with fresh info--
So I spent the morning with node editors in Nuke, Houdini, and Maya to see how they compare with Isadora. Many of their nodes do have fewer inputs than Isadora's, but there are inputs that are more commonly used than others and those are the ones that by default get hooked up (i.e. the leftmost input on a Houdini Node, the "B" pipe in a Merge node in Nuke). If this feature were to be implemented (and helpful) in Isadora, I think it would mainly apply to those where the reasonable behavior would be video in-->video out, i.e. throwing a Zoomer or Dots actor on a preexisting line between a movie player and a projector would automatically hook those inputs up, and they could easily be re-routed if this were a special case.I did come across two things that WOULD be (I think) handy in Isadora:1) (And this would work great in concert with the "automatic connection" idea above)--rather than drawing a whole new line between two actors when you need to change routing, endpoints could be "picked up and dragged" to a new input, saving a lot of mouse travel.2) It would be nice to be able to marquee or shift select multiple patch cords--if they are drawn out with elbows and a bunch of actors need to be moved, those lines can be obnoxious to have to move one at a time. It would be great if a bunch could be selected and moved at once.Just some input! -
1) (And this would work great in concert with the "automatic connection" idea above)--rather than drawing a whole new line between two actors when you need to change routing, endpoints could be "picked up and dragged" to a new input, saving a lot of mouse travel.
If I understand your properly you can do this already, either click and drag or even easier select the line and hit cmd+3 (windows ctrl+3) see attached video.Best Michel -
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What about those 'elbows'? Imagine being able to drag a patch cord from one node to another directly in one movement and then coming back to the cord to layout its path around any patching that the same cord may have crossed. Or is that also already possible? Regards bonemap
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Michel--fantastic! I must have missed it due to my lack of natural coordination. Thanks for the tip.
And regarding Bonemap's comment--in Nuke, the lines are by default straight to wherever they are going, but then if you click command or control, elbow "dots" (actual name, for once) appear at the halfway point on all the lines. If you click and drag one: presto, elbow. If not, they disappear.The nice thing about those is that the dots are essentially their own nodes, so you can drag a dot somewhere clean/organized and then actually run several connections off of it, rather than having to go back to the parent node each time. -
Hi, Shift click while patching a single cord output to multiple inputs, is another function that complements the Cmd+3 gem. Cheers bonemap
