topic Re: Select By Name in Maya Forum

Select By Name

Anonymous — Mon, 11 Jan 2021 07:58:05 GMT

Hi all,

Say, I have a hundred of these eyeball geometry, What should i type in the search bar (red box) so i can select all the geometry shape (green box) named eyeball but not selecting the constraint and parent (purple box)?

Thanks in advance.

Re: Select By Name

trs_andre — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 01:36:46 GMT

I believe selecting by name is going to be rather difficult, as the constraints include the same name...

I would code it in MEL, and maybe create a shortcut in the shelf, if it is an often used action.

Something like: check all objects, if the name doesn't have "eyeball", don't select. If it has, check if it is a constraint. If it is, don't select. If the parent is selected, deselect it. If it is not, remove from the list of objects to check. Select everything else that is a mesh. (Well you might instead check all objects' direct children to see if they are constraints and avoid selecting them)

Just an idea 🙂

Re: Select By Name

Anonymous — Tue, 12 Jan 2021 03:34:57 GMT

Thank you for the tip 👍

Re: Select By Name

Anonymous — Sat, 14 Aug 2021 00:32:13 GMT

Just use symbol "*" that matches any string and "?" that matches any single character. You can use it multiple times in select by name.

Re: Select By Name

vfxchris — Wed, 25 Aug 2021 21:54:10 GMT

Expanding on what @Anonymous said. Because you have been so beautifully diligent in your naming you can indeed use the select by name using a combination of '?' and '*'. You can use:

*eyeBall??Inner_?

* at the start means put any thing of any length here, this is just incase you have any names that may start different.
?? in the middle will replace you 01 / 02 etc with any 2 characters.
? at the end replaces the L/R.

And because you ended on a question mark (not a star) you are effectively saying that you can replace this single character, and there can be nothing after it. Because all your constraints have characters after the L / R they will be ignored by selection.