[Bf-funboard] Visibility and locking 2

[Thorsten Wilms]

Hi!

One of my goals for the system (see previous posts) is to 
allow showing/hiding of all objects of a kind by the same 
means used for general visibility management. That is the 
motivation for query groups, for example showing or hiding 
all armatures.
This also leads to allowing objects to be in several groups.

Now the problem with my previous proposal is, that it would 
render query groups useless for this! Setting the query 
group to invisible would only hide objects that are not set 
to visible (directly or in an also visible group).


Alternatives:
Like described before, 3dsmax has 3rd states for object 
visibility and locking called "ByParent". This means 
inheritance from the parent. Otherwise the settings of 
objects are independent.

The 3dsmax approach could be changed by having an 
"ToChildren" option for groups (less occurances of 3 state 
options). But if objects are allowed to be in several groups 
there would need to be a system to resolve conflicts.


An option would be to not have query groups and making 
group member ship exclusive. Then the still applying 
aspects of my proposal would work without problems.

Or groups would not have settings of their own, but 
would allow to change all childrens settings at once 
(not in a procedural way, but a one-time action, 
so that there are no conflicts).
Then again, this last idea could be combined with the 
original proposal. Resulting in a complexity that would 
need a prototype or at least a scenario/use-case ...


Oh, there's still the idea of using solo and mute buttons 
like in audio apps ...


Lets see what the basic requirements might be (visibility only, 
but same things might apply for rendering and locking), 
ordered by importance:

- Ability to hide/show single objects
- Ability to hide/show groups of objects
  (overwriting individual settings or taking them into 
  account / allowing both?)
- Ability to hide/show all objects of a type (like armatures)
  (overwriting individual settings or taking them into 
  account / allowing both?)
- Ability to hide/show vertice groups (of visible meshes)


---
Thorsten