topic Dock floating UI to a specific location in 3ds Max Programming Forum

Dock floating UI to a specific location

Anonymous — Thu, 03 May 2018 11:14:18 GMT

I have a tools menu I've made and I'd like it to be docked in a specific location when I load Max.

How can I do this?

If you look at this gif you can see that the floating ui is loaded when Max does, I want to to stay where its docked at the end of the gif.

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

malcomarmstrong — Wed, 09 May 2018 09:08:11 GMT

At first glance, you will probably need to create a custom .mnu file or have the code for the ui form part of a start up script that is executed as max opens or just after max has opened. We do a similar thing where we have our own toolbars, ui elements and other custom workspaces based around our toolset. You may even be able to have a modified max file as the default file to open with that has those elements stored as callbacks or some other method.

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

Anonymous — Wed, 09 May 2018 11:22:27 GMT

Thank you for your reply 🙂

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

blakestone — Mon, 14 May 2018 00:47:31 GMT

This example docks a basic GUI to the left-side, you can adjust the style to enable/disable features and docking position. Hope this helps?

global gui_handle
(
	fn gui_destroy = (
		try (cui.unregisterDialogBar gui_handle) catch()
		try (closeRolloutFloater gui_handle) catch()
		gui_handle = undefined
	)
	
	if (gui_handle == undefined) then (
		rollout gui_rollout1 "Title : Rollout1" (
			label gui_label "My Label #1..." pos:[5,5] width:100 height:20
		)
		
		rollout gui_rollout2 "Title : Rollout2" (
			label gui_label "My Label #2..." pos:[5,5] width:100 height:20
		)
		
		gui_handle = newRolloutFloater "Title : Script" 244 400
		addRollout gui_rollout1 gui_handle rolledUp:false border:true
		addRollout gui_rollout2 gui_handle rolledUp:false border:true
		cui.RegisterDialogBar gui_handle minSize:[0, 0] maxSize:[250, 400] style:#(#style_titlebar, #cui_floatable, #cui_dock_left, #cui_dock_right, #cui_handles) escapeEnable:false
		cui.dockDialogBar gui_handle #cui_dock_left
	)
	else ( gui_destroy() )
)

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

Anonymous — Tue, 15 May 2018 14:41:02 GMT

Thank you for your reply.

Looking further into this it doesnt seem like you can create tabs as part of the UI.

Unless anyone else has any suggestions?

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

denisT.MaxDoctor — Tue, 15 May 2018 17:28:18 GMT

leave the user a way how to organize his/her UI. for example, I do not like it when someone does it for me.

give a reason why you can do it better 😉

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

Anonymous — Wed, 16 May 2018 08:31:13 GMT

@denisT.MaxDoctorwrote:
leave the user a way how to organize his/her UI. for example, I do not like it when someone does it for me.
give a reason why you can do it better 😉

I completely agree, however in this case I'm the user 🙂

Thanks for your reply.

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

blakestone — Wed, 16 May 2018 08:48:42 GMT

was what i posted helpful at all?

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

Anonymous — Wed, 16 May 2018 14:01:30 GMT

@blakestonewrote:
was what i posted helpful at all?

It was thank you.
I still cant find a solution to tabbing ui though. But for now what you posted was useful.

Re: Dock floating UI to a specific location

malcomarmstrong — Thu, 17 May 2018 11:51:12 GMT

Perhaps then, a custom python or .Net interface parented to the Max window will help if you cant get tabbed interfaces to work. Do you have any images of what you want it to look like? By that, I mean when I am doing UIs to go into any particular application, I mock up a UI image to show how I want it, but thats just a working practice of mine, so just asking if thats something you do too.