topic Re: slate material editor: change the node default width? in 3ds Max Shading, Lighting and Rendering Forum

slate material editor: change the node default width?

mpowers — Fri, 25 Jan 2019 20:44:57 GMT

Is there a way to change the node default width to show the full name of the node in the slate material editor?

It would also be great if bitmap nodes would auto-name themselves to their bitmaps...

Thnx

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

dominique.bouthillette — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 16:52:43 GMT

Hi @mpowers,

Thanks for the post!

You can change the default width of any node in the Slate Material Editor by clicking and dragging out the corner icon in the lower-right area of the node (marked with lines like this "////").

As for auto-renaming nodes with their current Bitmap names, it may only be possible via scripting. You might see this post from some other Max users on the topic here: Rename diffuse maps according to their bitmap name.

If this is a feature/toggle you'd like to see in the future within 3ds Max, please feel free to add it to the 3ds Max Ideas forum so others can vote for it there as well.

I hope this can help!

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

mpowers — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 16:58:34 GMT

Thnx Dominique,

I am currently doing that. However, I would like to change the default width which all nodes are created with. As they are rarely wide enough to read node names that are accurately descriptive. Also every time I neaten my nodes they revert to the too narrow state.

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

dominique.bouthillette — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 18:50:16 GMT

Thanks for the clarification on this @mpowers. I spoke with a few of my colleagues from the development team, and it seems this is not something that can be changed inside of 3ds Max (as a default parameter setting at least).

However, they did mention that it may be possible to change the default size of the node via scripting, as there is a .size value for nodes in SME (Slate Material Editor). This property can be found within the 3ds Max Help Documentation which may be helpful for a custom script: Interface: SME

SME: Interface: WndBase

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

mpowers — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 19:28:42 GMT

Thank you. That will work!

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

dominique.bouthillette — Tue, 29 Jan 2019 19:32:46 GMT

No problem at all, very happy to help!

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

mpowers — Thu, 14 Feb 2019 16:03:02 GMT

Dominique, I think these only affects the window's size and position - not the material node's.

Interface: WndBase

Properties:

.position : point2 by value : Read|Write

Get/set the Position of the Node View.

.size : point2 by value : Read|Write

Get/set the Size of the Node View.

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

dominique.bouthillette — Thu, 14 Feb 2019 17:14:46 GMT

Thanks for the reply back on this @mpowers.

@ads_royje could you perhaps chime in on a scripting property that could be used to change the default SME node size? Thank you!

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

ads_royje — Fri, 15 Feb 2019 17:28:57 GMT

Hi @mpowers , @dominique.bouthillette ,

as you noted indeed, the .size property is for the Node view, not the Node.

My mistake as I misinformed Dominique 😕

Unfortunately, the size (or width) of Slate Material Editor Nodes is not exposed to Maxscript.

The Node's exposed properties are the ones documented ; .name, .position, .selected and .reference.
Nor is it exposed in SME.ini (C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Local\Autodesk\3dsMax\2019 - 64bit\ENU\plugcfg_ln\).

It would be a nice addon though! 🙂

Regards,

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

mpowers — Fri, 15 Feb 2019 18:22:22 GMT

Thank you. If there was an autoscale to text width function...

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

shinodem — Thu, 18 Apr 2019 07:47:47 GMT

so there is no solution for that?

by the way editor is very laggy on 4k in full screen

Re: slate material editor: change the node default width?

zsomborAFFE3 — Mon, 13 May 2019 04:30:31 GMT

Why is two of the posts marked as solution, since none of them are a solution??

It is misleading.

Also, there should be an option in the forums, where the thread is closed because that feature is not supported or not available in the program. (like in this case now).