Modo - how to make context specific hot keys?

DireWolf

I'm wondering if I can make hot keys that works while in a specific tool? I want to set hot key to set bevel round level which Modo seems to use different command for vertices and edges.

tool.attr vert.bevel level 0

tool.attr edge.bevel level 0

I want to bind them to the same hot key. If I am beveling vertices, I want the first command. If I am beveling edges I want the second command.

Is there a way to do this? Can anyone point me to the right direction, please? Thank you.

Tzur_H

Pretty sure you can, open the Input Editor, under Context choose 'contextless', under Edit Mode, choose Tools - then you need to find the tool in the massive list and keybind it to whatever you want.

I'm not sure if it'll work for you, maybe it's a custom CFG I've downloaded, but I can increase/decrease number of loops when beveling, creating primitives and other operations with A and D keys when the tool is active, give it a go

DireWolf

Wow that seems to be it... thank you!

Looks like mouse scroll wheel up/down is not available in the Input Editor?

WarrenM

No, sadly, it isn't. You have to install something like XMouse and hack it up.

DireWolf

That looks like a neat little app Thank you WarrenM

Combine that with my controller and joy2key, that should give me quite enough hot key to play with

stxtch

WarrenM wrote: »

No, sadly, it isn't. You have to install something like XMouse and hack it up.

Any technical advice on setting this up?
So far I understand that x-mouse will replace a hotkey with the scroll wheel, but first Modo needs a macro that assigns the Edge Bevel Round Value:?+1 and Round Value:?-1 to hotkeys. Also x-mouse seems to offer only a limited number of commands that mouse buttons can be mapped to, so I'm not sure how to change it to something that Modo can recognize.

DireWolf

X-mouse can make wheel up/down do all sorts of things, Simulated Keys is 1 option you can choose from. So in a sense, you replace that with normal keyboard press like {CTRL} Z and simply assign that hotkey to do something.

The way I found that works is to use weird combination that does nothing in contextless, like CTRL+ALT+SHIFT+somekey and disable "block original mouse input". So you're firing the hotkey everytime you scroll the wheel but it does nothing unless you're in the specific context you set the hotkey for.

StormyBA

It's well worth playing around building some "forms" set up on hotkeys as "pie menu's" they are pretty quick to set up and you can assign a lot of tools onto one hotkey.



It's well worth sitting with a pad, jotting down tools you use a lot and then working them up into Pie Menu's... Ive pretty much got the modeling one above and a UV working pie along with some duplication / mirror / selection tools set to standard hotkeys. All in all it works really well

DireWolf

What do you think about pie vs rectangular menu Stormy? I currently have 1 set up as normal rectangle menu.

StormyBA

When I first went to Maya a good few years back now I was not so keen but now I love them. Classic menues with a big list are quite open for error, as in its all so small its pretty easy to select the wrong tool.

With a Pie Menu it's all a lot more accurate, you just need to move in the general direction of your tool and its selected. Hit Ctrl + Space to get up a default pie menu for your window selection. Check out how the tool selection snaps through the tools as you move your mouse around.

Secondly you can put a menu with in a menu. For example when I hit the scripts it brings up a classic list menu. On the other hand if I hit Vert_Combine it opens up a second pie menu with a few vert weld tools.

It's also easy to order pie too, first thing in the list is at 12oclock and it works clockwise from there, very useful for bunching tools together.

I really recommend having a play with it, its weird at first but in the long run its a massive time saver and just makes your work flow a lot slicker + smoother

stxtch

Great, thanks DireWolf. After much trial and error I have it working correctly. I hadn't seen the Simulated Keys option originally. One more question - Is there a way to dynamically disable the scroll wheel zoom while using a specific tool (maybe by holding down a hotkey)? Or do you run Modo without scroll wheel zoom?

Thanks for the advice Stormy, I plan on setting up some pie menus next.

peanut™

While we are at it, don't forget about this little hidden pie-menu which is "Alt-Q". This is a great time saver when working in full screen if ever you get lost.

StormyBA

Seems like a bit of an odd pie! Why would you not use WER and 12345?!

peanut™

StormyBA wrote: »

Seems like a bit of an odd pie! Why would you not use WER and 12345?!

StormyBA your making me blush ... But i agree. This is for people learning the app coming from all walks of apps, this could be somehow useful. But somehow only, because like you said 1,2,3,4,5 gets the job done already

WarrenM

Plus, using those keys you can use the ALT versions to transfer selections to other mode and stuff like that.

DireWolf

Great. Now I know Alt+Q is perfectly fine to replace with my own pie hehe.

StormyBA

WarrenM wrote: »

Plus, using those keys you can use the ALT versions to transfer selections to other mode and stuff like that.

I love this feature!!!!