I've pushed an update to the Outliner for 3ds Max 2012, which fixes the issues introduced by Product Update 9 and 10. To get the new version (2.1.4.1), use the "check now" update button in the options dialog.
Thanks to Larry Minton from Autodesk for suggesting the workaround.
I use outliner for long time now and its one of the best things ever made for Max. A shame that Autodesk doesn't improve their tools in such a way by their own...anyway i spent you 10€ (no idea how much $ this is). Thx for dropping out this awesome tool for free!
So any word on Outliner 3.0? And is there any chance of getting support for drag-dropping layers in folders or changing the hierarchy? Draging over visibility/freeze icons to turn them on/off for multiple objects at once would be nice too.
I do love me some outliner. It's one of the scripts that I must have installed or I can't function.
I'm not sure there is much that can be improved upon?
Drag and Drop folders might be nice but I get along fine using the + at the end of the layers.
Dragging over visibility or freeze icons to turn them off would be nice too but I get along fine making a selection and clicking one of them on or off.
Being able to resize the window while docked would be great, but I totally understand if its outside of our control, there is only so much the max UI will let you do.
Not deleting empty layers when merging would be great. I think this was already brought up and shot down for one reason or another. I always forget to put at least one object on the organizational layers. It would be nice to have an option that puts a small, hidden dummy object on each layer so they merge properly. I can probably write something simple for myself but it might be nice to have something included in outliner.
I think Pier got a job, which is good for him and bad for us...
Outliner 3 was pretty advanced already, so i hope he'll release it all polished one day.
All my support Pier !
Autodesk just released SP3 for 3dsmax2014 and it causes a problem with outliner. Outliner throws up a message about updating nested folders and then max dies. If you uninstall outliner the files load fine. For me that's not really an option I can't stand to lose outliner.
If you're on SP2, max and outliner get along fine. So probably hold off on installing SP3 if you like using outliner.
EDIT:
It looks like this was a problem with only my work machine and probably a conflict with our virus scanner not allowing outliner to uninstall fully. After I removed all of the outliner files manually and reinstalled it has been working fine.
Sorry for the late reply, I kinda missed the past few posts.
The website has been down ever since I had a little issue with my previous hosting package expiring. There's a makeshift download page here though: http://outliner.pjanssen.nl
it's been a while since the last update again. There hasn't been that much going on to post updates about either though. I've mainly been busy with other things.
By now 3dsMax 2015 has been out for some time, bringing new features for its Scene Explorer. One of the things they added was nested layers. Autodesk has made it clear that they are not interested in a collab, so whatever the Outliner brings is not going to make it into base program. At least not directly.
This made me wonder how much need there still is for the Outliner. How do you guys think about this? What would you see as the main reasons for using the Outliner as a third-party plugin over the standard scene explorer? And would the benefits that it might bring be enough to pay for it?
I saw in your video about version 3.0 Thet the panel can be divided, so at the top I can have layer, at the buttom - materials, or other mode. This not exist in Max2015 scene explorer. Also, your tool is more intuitive to work with. There are feedbacks to AD sites where user asks to change some of the behaviours of the new Scene Explorer tool.
For me Outliner is better than new Scene Explorer in MAX2015.
I have ony one request, or if it is already done, can someone tell me how to achieve it - how to hide/unhide all layers at once. The same for Freeze/Unfreeze.
I'm still on 2012 aswell. I've installed 2015 to check that scene explorer. I have nasty refreshing bugs on the scene explorer UI. Not sure i'm up to date, so, i give Autodesk a chance here.
Well, it certainly makes Outliner a bit less awsome. It's pretty much the same as Outliner 2. Feeling that they ripped off your ideas ?
The configure columns is nice. Too bad there's no vertex count.
I don't really like how they have implemented selection set there. I'd have prefered a new tree to replace the slow named selection set.
No material mode, and i use it a lot with outliner.
Also, maybe just ergonomy taste, but right click doesnt select, so if you want to select chilnodes of an object, or get properties, you have to left click, then right click. And i don't like to click.
Pretty sure outliner 3, on the rails it was, is better than this Scene Explorer.
Now Scene Explorer might evolve too.
Also i believe that, sadly undirectly, you pushed them to develop it.
So, many thanks Pier. Anyway i'm still on 2012 and don't plan to change, so i'll still use your Outliner for a while.
it's been a while since the last update again. There hasn't been that much going on to post updates about either though. I've mainly been busy with other things.
By now 3dsMax 2015 has been out for some time, bringing new features for its Scene Explorer. One of the things they added was nested layers. Autodesk has made it clear that they are not interested in a collab, so whatever the Outliner brings is not going to make it into base program. At least not directly.
This made me wonder how much need there still is for the Outliner. How do you guys think about this? What would you see as the main reasons for using the Outliner as a third-party plugin over the standard scene explorer? And would the benefits that it might bring be enough to pay for it?
As with their implementation of quad chamfer (Which somehow misses the entire point and still manages to produce triangles and n-gons. I mean WTF?!?!), the communities efforts are still better.
Your outliner is better. Can you recompile for 2015?
I think that Outliner is faaar more intuitive, complex and production ready than what AD made with Scene Explorer in 2015. The features I like a lot is materials category, all the sorting methods, the Right Click Menu, and from the v 3 demos, I really like the option to divide the window. Please, do not tell me I have to wait 2 or 3 years before AD comes to upgrade the SE to what you have by now implemented.
So, as a conlcusion, YES! continue to develop this great tool
This made me wonder how much need there still is for the Outliner. How do you guys think about this? What would you see as the main reasons for using the Outliner as a third-party plugin over the standard scene explorer? And would the benefits that it might bring be enough to pay for it?
The new scene explore is all kinds of unfriendly. It's convoluted, counter intuitive and ugly. The only conclusion I can come up with is that they either refuse to use/test their own tools or they hate their users.
#1: Frustrating way to select objects. In Outliner: clicking a layer selects the objects on that layer.
In 3dsmax2015: clicking a layer deselects everything.
If you want to re-select the objects on that layer, you need to use the quad menu to "select child nodes".
#2: Adding objects to layers is harder than it needs to be.
Instead of a convenient little + icon next to the layers (like outliner) they tucked it inside of a fly out menu, inside the quad menu. A lot of clicks to do something that is a single click in outliner. Oh but the fun doesn't stop there, once on the new layer it deselects everything.
#3: Whatever is selected gets added to any new layer.
THEN DESELECTS EVERYTHING. It assumes you're done with those objects and that you intended them to go on that layer. If not get ready for headache getting them back on the right layers.
#4: Missing convenient filtering options.
3dsmax2015 has "Toggle Display Toolbar" but it then just spills out all the filter options in a vertical toolbar. It isn't nearly as convenient as outliners right click filter settings, that take up a smaller place and can be globally toggled on or off from that one simple button, the max button just toggles the visibility of the toolbar on the side.
#5: Missing material mode.
Which means I have to go back to using the material editors convoluted way of selecting objects by material... bahh...
#6: Lack of preferences.
Outliner has a lot of options and customization that is available in the preferences menu.Since not every job is the same it helps to be able to turn on/off certain settings. But max brute forces a "one size doesn't fit most" method and doesn't let you configure jack. Take it or leave it as it is, they probably won't be back to tweak it until 10-15 years from now.
I once (quite along time ago) put a feature request to autodesk asking for the outliner in max but recently I got an email that it was rejected since improvements were made to the scene explorer.
I still use outliner day-to-day.
I would happily pay for outliner as it saves me a lot of time at work and home.
Mark did a good list of the flaws that the Max built in has. I've been mucking about with 2015 on one project and after a few days I installed Outliner. There is familiarity bias there, but does what I need out of the box (useage: bog standard look dev > modeling 90% of the time).
Having AD put in a similar feature is going to shrink the potential market unfortunately. Although AD's recent history doesn't suggest they'll continue to improve it, which should open doors, it does seem like narrow margins.
That said Outliner is brilliant and has been for years, thank you very much.
Well, i've only tested it for ten minutes. I'm not really surprised by the complains here and cgtalk. You had years of users feedbacks from dynamic communities to polish an intuitive tool. Autodesk decided to not take that into account. All your new ideas for outliner 3 where actually pretty smart and not present in scene explorer.
Like something as brillant and yet so simple as display a name's last letters when resizing the window, or "action buttons", or material mode, or selection set mode...
I'm sometimes a bit dishonnest in my Autodesk bashing, but here really i think there's a professional misconduct on their side.
#1: Frustrating way to select objects. In Outliner: clicking a layer selects the objects on that layer.
In 3dsmax2015: clicking a layer deselects everything.
If you want to re-select the objects on that layer, you need to use the quad menu to "select child nodes".
First, I have one thing to add to your list of annoyances, it is the fact that layers expand when you add a selection to it. Pisses me off to no end.
But the other thing, concerning the quote above is that it can be toggled on and off. In the Selection menu at the top of the layers panel you can toggle on and off "Select Children" (hotkey ctrl+C) which would allow you to select the layer title and it'll auto select every object in the layer. BUT... this is a double edged sword because if you forget to turn this off and want to rename the layer, it will also rename every object you have selected, too. Ridiculous.
Hooray there's a work around for it. Oh... but it can punch you in the nuts.
I'm animating with lots of objects, bones, controllers and constrains all with specific names, its not worth the risk, especially with the other headaches.
I have decided to stop the development of the Outliner. There are basically two major reasons for this decision:
1. I don't want to have to compete with Autodesk
The Scene Explorer got a bit of an overhaul in 3dsMax 2015, with some of its new features being based on the Outliner. Even though Autodesk may not have the best reputation in continued development of new tools, it does seem likely to me that more features will be added in the future. If they do, it would make the Outliner less useful over time. And I'm not going to develop new features just to have Autodesk "copy" them, however flattering that may be.
2. 3dsMax is not a good platform for developers
Developing tools with maxscript is not too bad, but the C++ SDK is a different story. It's poorly documented and without any support, it's pretty hard to work with. The C# wrapper for the SDK makes it worse by being incomplete and convoluted. Some things you would really want to be able to do are plain impossible (catching errors in a generic way for example).
So it's simply not fun developing plugins for 3dsMax. And the fact that I would have to pay for a full license just to develop the Outliner doesn't help either.
I've made the source code for the Outliner 3.0 as it is today available under the MIT open source license on GitHub: https://github.com/Pjanssen/Outliner-3.0 So it's free for everyone to continue developing it. I would be happy to provide some support there.
Finally, thank you to everyone who has supported this project over the past six years through feature ideas and donations. The interaction with all of you has been a really positive experience!
Sorry to hear that Pjanssen; Outliner is always the first plugin I install when I do a fresh install of Max! Thanks for releasing the Source code too, hopefully someone can keep on top of it!
Sad to hear but totally understandable. Currently I do a script which depends heavily on dotNet and it's as well really bad documented. Thanks for all the work, Outliner makes my day easier every day!
Yeah, makes me wonder if community energy shouldn't be directed towards open projects (aka Blender). Anyway, Outliner2 is already so great, i use it every day.
That's a shame, but totally understandable, especially if you have to buy a copy just to maintain it, that's pretty crappy. I agree if they put a little more effort into Scene Explore it could mimic outliner a lot better than it currently does.
Thanks for one of the best tools out there, it has been amazing using it! And thanks for releasing the source, I selfishly hope someone can keep it maintained until autodesk gets their act together
Replies
Because 2.1.5 is exclusive for 2013 and will give this message when trying to install it on 2012.
Thanks to let us know Pier.
Autodesk: fix 1 bug, make 5 new
Thanks to Larry Minton from Autodesk for suggesting the workaround.
Yepp, they got their priorities straight
https://vimeo.com/50001064
http://script.threesixty.nl/outliner/index.php/blog/2012/09/presets-and-multiple-treeviews
Great work !
So nice to see this tool taking form.
New version looks awesome
http://script.threesixty.nl/outliner/index.php/blog/2012/11/advanced-filter-configuration-preview
https://vimeo.com/53113164
I'm not sure there is much that can be improved upon?
Drag and Drop folders might be nice but I get along fine using the + at the end of the layers.
Dragging over visibility or freeze icons to turn them off would be nice too but I get along fine making a selection and clicking one of them on or off.
Being able to resize the window while docked would be great, but I totally understand if its outside of our control, there is only so much the max UI will let you do.
Not deleting empty layers when merging would be great. I think this was already brought up and shot down for one reason or another. I always forget to put at least one object on the organizational layers. It would be nice to have an option that puts a small, hidden dummy object on each layer so they merge properly. I can probably write something simple for myself but it might be nice to have something included in outliner.
Outliner 3 was pretty advanced already, so i hope he'll release it all polished one day.
All my support Pier !
Do you mean parenting layers by drag&drop ? It already works, by clicking on a layer's name
If you're on SP2, max and outliner get along fine. So probably hold off on installing SP3 if you like using outliner.
EDIT:
It looks like this was a problem with only my work machine and probably a conflict with our virus scanner not allowing outliner to uninstall fully. After I removed all of the outliner files manually and reinstalled it has been working fine.
The website has been down ever since I had a little issue with my previous hosting package expiring. There's a makeshift download page here though: http://outliner.pjanssen.nl
it's been a while since the last update again. There hasn't been that much going on to post updates about either though. I've mainly been busy with other things.
By now 3dsMax 2015 has been out for some time, bringing new features for its Scene Explorer. One of the things they added was nested layers. Autodesk has made it clear that they are not interested in a collab, so whatever the Outliner brings is not going to make it into base program. At least not directly.
This made me wonder how much need there still is for the Outliner. How do you guys think about this? What would you see as the main reasons for using the Outliner as a third-party plugin over the standard scene explorer? And would the benefits that it might bring be enough to pay for it?
For me Outliner is better than new Scene Explorer in MAX2015.
I have ony one request, or if it is already done, can someone tell me how to achieve it - how to hide/unhide all layers at once. The same for Freeze/Unfreeze.
Well, it certainly makes Outliner a bit less awsome. It's pretty much the same as Outliner 2. Feeling that they ripped off your ideas ?
The configure columns is nice. Too bad there's no vertex count.
I don't really like how they have implemented selection set there. I'd have prefered a new tree to replace the slow named selection set.
No material mode, and i use it a lot with outliner.
Also, maybe just ergonomy taste, but right click doesnt select, so if you want to select chilnodes of an object, or get properties, you have to left click, then right click. And i don't like to click.
Pretty sure outliner 3, on the rails it was, is better than this Scene Explorer.
Now Scene Explorer might evolve too.
Also i believe that, sadly undirectly, you pushed them to develop it.
So, many thanks Pier. Anyway i'm still on 2012 and don't plan to change, so i'll still use your Outliner for a while.
As with their implementation of quad chamfer (Which somehow misses the entire point and still manages to produce triangles and n-gons. I mean WTF?!?!), the communities efforts are still better.
Your outliner is better. Can you recompile for 2015?
So, as a conlcusion, YES! continue to develop this great tool
#1: Frustrating way to select objects.
In Outliner: clicking a layer selects the objects on that layer.
In 3dsmax2015: clicking a layer deselects everything.
If you want to re-select the objects on that layer, you need to use the quad menu to "select child nodes".
#2: Adding objects to layers is harder than it needs to be.
Instead of a convenient little + icon next to the layers (like outliner) they tucked it inside of a fly out menu, inside the quad menu. A lot of clicks to do something that is a single click in outliner. Oh but the fun doesn't stop there, once on the new layer it deselects everything.
#3: Whatever is selected gets added to any new layer.
THEN DESELECTS EVERYTHING. It assumes you're done with those objects and that you intended them to go on that layer. If not get ready for headache getting them back on the right layers.
#4: Missing convenient filtering options.
3dsmax2015 has "Toggle Display Toolbar" but it then just spills out all the filter options in a vertical toolbar. It isn't nearly as convenient as outliners right click filter settings, that take up a smaller place and can be globally toggled on or off from that one simple button, the max button just toggles the visibility of the toolbar on the side.
#5: Missing material mode.
Which means I have to go back to using the material editors convoluted way of selecting objects by material... bahh...
#6: Lack of preferences.
Outliner has a lot of options and customization that is available in the preferences menu.Since not every job is the same it helps to be able to turn on/off certain settings. But max brute forces a "one size doesn't fit most" method and doesn't let you configure jack. Take it or leave it as it is, they probably won't be back to tweak it until 10-15 years from now.
I still use outliner day-to-day.
I would happily pay for outliner as it saves me a lot of time at work and home.
Or modo.
Having AD put in a similar feature is going to shrink the potential market unfortunately. Although AD's recent history doesn't suggest they'll continue to improve it, which should open doors, it does seem like narrow margins.
That said Outliner is brilliant and has been for years, thank you very much.
Like something as brillant and yet so simple as display a name's last letters when resizing the window, or "action buttons", or material mode, or selection set mode...
I'm sometimes a bit dishonnest in my Autodesk bashing, but here really i think there's a professional misconduct on their side.
First, I have one thing to add to your list of annoyances, it is the fact that layers expand when you add a selection to it. Pisses me off to no end.
But the other thing, concerning the quote above is that it can be toggled on and off. In the Selection menu at the top of the layers panel you can toggle on and off "Select Children" (hotkey ctrl+C) which would allow you to select the layer title and it'll auto select every object in the layer. BUT... this is a double edged sword because if you forget to turn this off and want to rename the layer, it will also rename every object you have selected, too. Ridiculous.
I'm animating with lots of objects, bones, controllers and constrains all with specific names, its not worth the risk, especially with the other headaches.
I have decided to stop the development of the Outliner. There are basically two major reasons for this decision:
1. I don't want to have to compete with Autodesk
The Scene Explorer got a bit of an overhaul in 3dsMax 2015, with some of its new features being based on the Outliner. Even though Autodesk may not have the best reputation in continued development of new tools, it does seem likely to me that more features will be added in the future. If they do, it would make the Outliner less useful over time. And I'm not going to develop new features just to have Autodesk "copy" them, however flattering that may be.
2. 3dsMax is not a good platform for developers
Developing tools with maxscript is not too bad, but the C++ SDK is a different story. It's poorly documented and without any support, it's pretty hard to work with. The C# wrapper for the SDK makes it worse by being incomplete and convoluted. Some things you would really want to be able to do are plain impossible (catching errors in a generic way for example).
So it's simply not fun developing plugins for 3dsMax. And the fact that I would have to pay for a full license just to develop the Outliner doesn't help either.
I've made the source code for the Outliner 3.0 as it is today available under the MIT open source license on GitHub: https://github.com/Pjanssen/Outliner-3.0 So it's free for everyone to continue developing it. I would be happy to provide some support there.
Finally, thank you to everyone who has supported this project over the past six years through feature ideas and donations. The interaction with all of you has been a really positive experience!
Thanks for one of the best tools out there, it has been amazing using it! And thanks for releasing the source, I selfishly hope someone can keep it maintained until autodesk gets their act together