Message #312

From: Melinda Green <melinda@superliminal.com>
Subject: Re: [MC4D] Macros
Date: Sat, 12 Aug 2006 13:05:20 -0700

Don Hatch wrote:
> Regarding an arbitrary number of reference stickers… it would make sense.
> 3 is always sufficient, so in the original
> implementation I made it always 3 for simplicity– if you want 2 or 1 instead,
> you can just click one of the reference stickers twice
> (e.g. 24, 27,27 as Remi described), or 3 times, which is kind of ugly
> but it works.
> Even a 0-reference-stickers macro makes sense, since
> sometimes the orientation of the cube doesn’t matter at all–
> e.g. a checkerboard macro.
>
> I think allowing a variable number of reference stickers
> would make the concept a bit harder to learn initially
> ("click 3 reference stickers" is a nice clear non-intimidating
> solid chunk for a newbie to bite off;
> "click reference stickers and hit ctrl-m when you’re done"
> is a more confusing by comparison). But, once the concept and
> workflow is learned, I think variable number of reference stickers
> would be nicer to use.
>

What are the ramifications when using fewer reference stickers with your
PolygonManager API? Would I simply copy the last reference however many
times needed to supply 3 refs or what?

> Bugs and enhancement requests for the version I just downloaded:
> - should say "Hit ctrl-m when finished" instead of
> "Hit ‘m’ when finished"
>

Done.

> - I think it always applies in reverse,
> whether or not I have shift down?
>

Good eyes. It worked OK when triggered via the Macros sub-menu but it
was my fault that I broke it when triggered via <ctrl>a. Should be fixed
now.

> - after I cancel instead of naming the macro,
> it makes a macro named "null"
>

Thanks again. This too should now be fixed.

> - would be nice to have a keyboard-only way
> to invoke a macro (menus are really tedious)
> - menus "remove macro definition" and "rename macro definition"
> would be nice– I seldom get the macro right the first time,
> and so I end up with a lot of garbage macros in the list.
>

I intend to implement these and other niceties in subsequent versions. I
just wanted to get feedback on the basic functionality first to make
sure that I’m not building on top of a stupid or broken design.

> - macro names with ‘@’ in them are silently lost when saved/loaded,
> I think

I kept the ‘@’ delimiters that were used in the original C
implementation that you or Jay wrote though I suppose I could remove
that but then you would not be able to use the ‘(‘ key that denotes the
beginning of the reference data. It seems like there needs to be some
forbidden character so I suppose that ‘@’ is as good as any but I’m very
open to suggestions.

Thanks for the detailed feedback Don,
-Melinda