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<div>Have you looked into a portable install? You could put a portable
copy (meaning it keeps the settings inside the program folder, rather
than the user documents one) on dropbox and share the directory with
your employees. This would, as far as I know, keep all settings.
Interface, plugins, hotkeys, scripts...<br>
<br></div>
I don't know if it's possible to easily make Blender portable yourself,
though there's a version up on <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://portableapps.com">portableapps.com</a>.
personally I'd like an option inside of Blender that can set the user
directory. I've done this with NVIL, and keep my entire folder on
dropbox. This way any changes I make at work get propagated to my home
install automatically, without me having to set up symlinks on every
computer. <br>
</blockquote>
<br>
When you are on the Download page at blender.org, there is an option to
download an installer or a zip. The zip contains a portable version,
with all the settings inside. I put it on Google Drive, works without
problems.<br>
<br>
I'm not sure about Mac's.<br>
<br>
<br>
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<font color="#9FA2A5"><span style="padding-left:6px">11 października
2013 12:50</span></font></div></div></div>
<div style="color:#888888;margin-left:24px;margin-right:24px;"
__pbrmquotes="true" class="__pbConvBody"><div dir="ltr"><div><div><div>Colin:<br><br></div>These
are all great points. While I advocate really getting to know a program
intimately before you suggest changes (something I've been doing), your
usecase is interesting, and certainly a worthy idea.<br>
</div>Have you looked into a portable install? You could put a portable
copy (meaning it keeps the settings inside the program folder, rather
than the user documents one) on dropbox and share the directory with
your employees. This would, as far as I know, keep all settings.
Interface, plugins, hotkeys, scripts...<br>
<br></div>I don't know if it's possible to easily make Blender portable
yourself, though there's a version up on <a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="http://portableapps.com">portableapps.com</a>. personally I'd like
an option inside of Blender that can set the user directory. I've done
this with NVIL, and keep my entire folder on dropbox. This way any
changes I make at work get propagated to my home install automatically,
without me having to set up symlinks on every computer.<br>
</div><div class="gmail_extra"><br clear="all"><div><a
moz-do-not-send="true" href="http://flickr.com/photos/michaelknubben/">http://flickr.com/photos/michaelknubben/</a></div>
<br><br><br></div>
<div>_______________________________________________<br>Bf-gamedev
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<font color="#9FA2A5"><span style="padding-left:6px">11 października
2013 04:23</span></font></div></div></div>
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<div>Thank you Jason and Brecht. It's encouraging that it seems some of
what I was hoping for can be done as the program stands.<div><br></div><div>To
Brecht, I've been slogging through this very long audio dialogue about
the Blender UI.</div>
<div><a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="https://soundcloud.com/andrew-price/episode-11-jonathan-williamson">https://soundcloud.com/andrew-price/episode-11-jonathan-williamson</a></div><div>Part
way through, Williamson describes a drawing program that cloned much of
photoshops core functions and hotkeys, and used it to gain many early
adopters. They also discuss how many users used the maya presets to
first get introduced to Blender. </div>
<div><br></div><div>From my perspective, as an animation lead, I have to
consider who I can hire. I might find some talented Blender users, but
the vast majority of people that apply at Unknown Worlds are these days
Maya users, and still a good few that are Max. For new hires and
contract workers we bring in, we need them to be able to jump right into
production. We do not have much loose cash to train people up. So, in
our studio, if we adopted Blender, it would be very beneficial if we
could implement keys and layouts that laid out tools and conventions
similar to the other major packages.</div>
<div><br></div><div>To a great extent what you describe, <span>key
shortcuts, adding panels, tool shelves, and </span><span>making these
easy to share, are really what I need. If I can put the tools and the
familiar hotkeys for a new hire all front and center, the new hire can
get to work with minimal knowledge. They'll have issues, but it won't be
showstoppers.</span></div>
<div><span> </span></div><div>Now, if the new function allowed us to
also load into our panels custom scripts, we could get clever and also
load pertinent trait sliders and make some common buttons to aid
artists. It might not be fancy at first, but it could lead to some
streamlined blender environment designs within a studio over time.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Finally, to reiterate a point,</div><div>It would be
important that these environments be easy to load and save. With
developers, you're rarely talking about a single knowledgeable user.
You're usually dealing with at least a few, and each with varying
technical aptitudes. In today's studios, you might also be working with
people across the globe who may work at different hours or with some
language barriers. The process of sharing these customizations needs to
be extremely simple, so that's why I'm asking for the ability to save
and load these configurations.</div>
<div><div><br></div></div></div><div><br><br><div>On Thu, Oct 10, 2013
at 4:25 PM, Brecht Van Lommel <span><<a moz-do-not-send="true"
href="mailto:brechtvanlommel@pandora.be">brechtvanlommel@pandora.be</a>></span>
wrote:<br>
</div><br></div>
<div>_______________________________________________<br>Bf-gamedev
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!important;">Brecht Van Lommel</a></div> <div
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<font color="#9FA2A5"><span style="padding-left:6px">10 października
2013 23:25</span></font></div></div></div>
<div style="color:#888888;margin-left:24px;margin-right:24px;"
__pbrmquotes="true" class="__pbConvBody"><div>Here's some feedback as a
developer:<br><br>A lot of customization is already possible by creating
a custom<br>startup.blend, along with scripts and addons that run on
startup. It<br>may not be a single file but it shouldn't be difficult to
add a few<br>files to the configuration folder, or even to distribute
Blender with<br>the configuration bundled?<br><br>There are some
limitations in our user interface code though, that<br>make some types
of changes impossible. Both addon writers and people<br>who want to
customize Blender would benefit from work on the API to<br>make more
customizations possible. And I think everyone agrees a<br>better toolbar
with custom toolshelfs is a feature we should have.<br><br><br>However,
personally, I think the challenge of making a complex<br>application
emulate another application, or even making a task<br>oriented user
interface, is underestimated. One reason is that I can't<br>remember any
complex application emulating another in a satisfying<br>way. I've only
ever seen it done poorly. Maybe you can link to some<br>examples where
it was done well? In my experience, if you have to work<br>with a clone
or restricted subset of some application, it's always<br>going to be
frustrating.<br><br>If we talk about custom toolshelfs, key shortcuts,
adding panels, and<br>making these easy to share, then I agree, that's a
good idea. Beyond<br>that however, I'm a bit skeptical if anyone would
actually invest the<br>time to implement and maintain that kind of
thing, and get a result<br>that artists are happy with.<br><br><br>Brecht.<br><br></div><div><!---->_______________________________________________<br>Bf-gamedev
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#EDEEF0;padding-top:5px"> <div
style="display:table-cell;vertical-align:middle;padding-right:6px;"><img
photoaddress="colin.k.work@gmail.com" photoname="Colin Knueppel"
src="cid:part2.04010301.07080906@gmail.com"
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style="display:table-cell;white-space:nowrap;vertical-align:middle;width:100%">
<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:colin.k.work@gmail.com"
style="color:#737F92
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!important;">Colin Knueppel</a></div> <div
style="display:table-cell;white-space:nowrap;vertical-align:middle;">
<font color="#9FA2A5"><span style="padding-left:6px">10 października
2013 21:02</span></font></div></div></div>
<div style="color:#888888;margin-left:24px;margin-right:24px;"
__pbrmquotes="true" class="__pbConvBody"><div dir="ltr"><div
style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">I created this to
send to the commiters group. I don't believe they accepted the proposal
for viewing. I'm posting it hear to see developer response. Rather than
making it a UI discussion, I've framed it as a feature. I'm curious if
the reasoning is compelling?</div>
<div style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px"><br></div><div
style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px"><br></div><div
style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">It would be a great
feature for developers to have the ability to easily load layout,
interface preferences and panel scripts with one file. </div>
<div style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px"><br></div><span
style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">By allowing these
three things to be modified by one file, it allows the whole environment
to be customed to particular tasks. This makes creating environments to
speed new workers into Blender possible. Also, by making it as easy as
one file to load, it becomes practical for a studio to deploy over
multiple workstations or to satellite workers. Additionally, it
encourages sharing, which may allow studios to collaborate on tools and
other panel innovations. </span><div
style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">
<br></div><div style="font-family:arial,sans-serif;font-size:13px">Practical
example:<br><div>Say we hire a modeler that's very familiar with
ZBrush. In preparation for their arrival, we get to work on the
environment they will use. With the layout, we remove timeline and other
general use panels. We then recreate the left, right, top and bottom
bars you'd see in many art programs. We create subdivisions in those
sidebars and populate them with a script that calls graphical icons and
ties them to blender functions. We custom some panels to show material
representations of the current sculpting brush. Another panel to custom
the Brush behavior. Other panels to show the various brush presets you
can select from, and so on. We then go into the user interface and mimic
hotkeys from zbrush. When the new hire arrives, she or he will be
greeted with a somewhat familiar environment to get started. He or she
then can just get to work, losing little productivity and getting them
comfortable with some of Blender's great capabilities.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Now lets say that hire is used to retopology and UV
Unwrap in 3dsMax. We could go through a similar process, recreating the
environment, hotkeys and some tools. With the ability to easily load the
environment, they could swap back and forth between the function of
modeling and the retopology and UV Unwrap in one file with relative
ease. Again, they'd lose less time learning Blender, but get to
appreciate the tool.</div>
<div><br></div><div>Let's say one year down the line, our artist is
really digging Blender. They've gotten deeper into the functions and
they see potential for ways to use the program like no one would have
expected. With this feature, they could innovate a new layout and tools
with Blender. They could even share that design with other studios or
the community and enrich the program for everyone, or impress other
studios with the program's versatility.</div>
</div></div><div class="gmail_extra"><br><br><br></div>
<div>_______________________________________________<br>Bf-gamedev
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<a moz-do-not-send="true" href="mailto:colin.k.work@gmail.com"
style="color:#737F92
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!important;">Colin Knueppel</a></div> <div
style="display:table-cell;white-space:nowrap;vertical-align:middle;">
<font color="#9FA2A5"><span style="padding-left:6px">9 października
2013 02:17</span></font></div></div></div>
<div style="color:#888888;margin-left:24px;margin-right:24px;"
__pbrmquotes="true" class="__pbConvBody"><div dir="ltr">But consider the
process in total<div><br></div><div>To follow the current system: </div><div>User
loads a file <br></div><div>Saves the layout or tool</div><div>Loads
new file</div><div>Selects that new layout or tool</div>
<div>If user has custom keys for task, they need to load those as well<br><div><br></div><div>Compare
that to: </div></div><div>Load a UI, presets and all</div><div><br></div><div>Each
task in the current circumstance is not hard, but it amounts to needing
explanation. Any user can understand the load UI, as we all know how to
load files. However, with the current system, many users would need to
be walked through the reasoning and steps to implement any new layout or
custom tool. </div>
<div><br></div><div>Consider this process from a studio standpoint. We
create a suite of tools and layouts to address our various hires. We end
up with 3 Maya based layouts (modeling, uv/rigging/texture, animation),
3 max based layouts, 1 texturer focused layout and a couple compositing
layouts (one to replace premiere). We have 12 workstations we want to
deploy it to. Load 9 files across 12 workstations, saving out each
layout and save interface presets where they can be easily loaded. Also,
teach each user to access interface presets and what that means.
Alternatively, hire a tech to create a deployment system (cost out of
pocket and always trial and error). </div>
<div>Also, with Unknown worlds, we employ people from literally around
the world, Australia to Austria to England to US (east, middle and west)
and for a while the Philippines. People aren't even functioning at the
same time of day and often have some language barriers that cause
hickups. </div>
<div><br></div><div>Compare that to:</div><div>Save the file. Send it to
each employee. They then just load it.</div><div><br></div><div>The
current system isn't hard, but it's not without some logistical
problems. The act of deploying becomes a burden. This discourages the
practice. </div>
<div>If you made the experience encapsulated within a file, it becomes
something that people can simply share, use and learn from. </div></div><div
class="gmail_extra"><br><br><br></div>
<div>_______________________________________________<br>Bf-gamedev
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