Superquick Maya key bind question

Rox

So, looks like I have a chance of actually getting a job, working with Maya. I'm used to XSI even though I've used Maya before, and to soften the blow of switching from one to the other yet again, I decided to customize some of Maya's hotkeys to feel more familiar to XSI. But there's one major problem, and that's the Alt key, for camera movement. Is there any way to bind that to another key? Say, a key that won't break my thumb off if I don't want to move my entire hand every time I want to adjust the camera a bit?

I honestly don't get why Alt seems to be a default camera key in so many apps. I think it's natural to want to cover the most used keys with one finger for each to reduce hand movement. But the only way I can do that in Maya is to have the thumb under the hand so the other fingers are on the QWER row, where the tools are. And that's not particularly comfortable!

bugo

yeah, i use thumb finger, and i particulary find it pretty confortable, i set my other hand keys at q,w,e,r,d,a, etc

Rox

Odd. I'm really used to how I have it in XSI, fingers focused on S, D, F (camera, viewport maximize/minimize and center on selection), with X, C, V right below (that's scale, rotate, translate), thumb on space bar (object select) and pinky near shift for selection purposes. It's extremely close to the equally familiar WASD formation, and I like it like that. Maya, I don't like as much.

By the way, it seems I've also forgotten how to make Maya skip the whole "click and drag twice to make a cube" thing it's got going. Last time I used Maya I disabled it, so it makes a cube of a certain size at 0, 0, 0 instantly, and that's the way I want it, but I can't remember how I did it now. Anyone feel like refreshing my memory?

fmnoor

Turn off Interactive Creation, listed underneath the polygon primitives.

Funky Bunnies

yeah it's in create->polygons/nurbs

as far as the navigation, it's been coded in the API and there's no effective way to change it with mel. there are orbit,track,tumble contexts, but they wouldn't be as well integrated as the real navigation.

You can see if any tech artists would be willing to set up a new navigation with the API for you,
but I think you'd both be better off just using the slightly different keysets.

As soon as you change one big thing you'll find a domino effect of other keys and commands you'll have to change. I think it's better to pick your battles

Rox

Ahh, thanks a ton, guys. Shame about the pesky Alt key. All programs should have a hotkey editor like XSI's! And also a default scheme like XSI's. And an interface like XSI's.

Yeah, okay, all 3D apps should be XSI if you ask me... but whatevs. Guess I'll have to keep switching between S and Alt. I guess I'll get used to it soon.

And yeah, as for the domino effect, none of the keys I wanted to change in Maya actually had functions I wanted to keep, anyway. S is set key! I keep pressing that by accident and messing up animations anyway, so that one has to go somewhere else no matter what.

Anyway, thanks again.