Lets you customize various settings and options of Alias.
Interface
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Click one of these radio buttons to customize the display of your icons. This option is saved when you exit. Choose one of
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A check mark in the check box turns on icon labels, which show text labels beneath icons. This option is saved when you exit
from Alias.
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Turn off or on text hints that appear in the interface when the mouse cursor hovers over a tool icon for longer than 1 second.
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Turn off or on the units and grid size information on the top of the active modeling window.
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Use to turn on or off the appearance of the status bar at the bottom of the Alias window.
Input
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Choose either or . Specifies whether the numbers that you type for Transform functions are absolute () or relative () addresses. ABS uses the origin for placement (0, 0, 0), and 0 degrees along the X, Y, and Z axes for rotation. REL uses
the object’s current placement and rotation.
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Check the Pick Chooser on or off. If it is on (the default), a small box appears under the mouse when more than one object
is picked by a mouse click. This box contains a list of all pickable items under the mouse and allows you to choose the one
you want.
Mouse mapping for perspective move
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Choose one of the following to determine the way the mouse buttons enable you to move objects in the perspective view:
- Left=X Mid=Y Right=Z
- Left=Free Mid=X Right=Y
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Choose one of the following to determine the way the mouse buttons enable you to move objects in the perspective view when
you have set a construction plane:
- Left=X Mid=Y Right=Z
- Left=Free Mid=X Right=Y
Viewing
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Select the view control to display when you enter camera move mode in the Perspective view ( + (Windows) or + (Mac)).
– Displays no view control.
– Displays the Viewing Panel. See Use the view panel.
– Displays the ViewCube.
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Specifies the time (in seconds) it takes for one view to smoothly rotate into another. Choose a value between 0.0 and 4.0
by typing in the numeric field or dragging the slider.
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Specifies the behavior of the mouse buttons while navigating in the perspective view, when the (Windows) or (Mac) and keys are held down.
This option only appears if is set to . When using the , the option is part of the NavBar.
– The mouse buttons behave as follows:
- Left – Moving the mouse horizontally controls the azimuth. Moving the mouse vertically controls the elevation.
- Middle – Tracks horizontally and vertically.
- Right – Moving the mouse vertically dollies in and out. Moving the mouse horizontally twists.
– The mouse buttons behave as follows:
- Left – Tumbles horizontally or vertically around the cursor position, or the point of interest, if present. (Click and release
to position the point of interest.)
- Middle – Tracks horizontally and vertically.
- Right – Dollies in and out.
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Forces tumbling to happen around one axis. Tumbling is constrained about an axis that is perpendicular to the line described
by the initial mouse movement, and once the tumble has been started, the mouse needs to deviate substantially off the initial
line in order for the camera to no longer tumble about the initially described axis.
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Larger values make it easier for the tumbling to get constrained to an axis. Smaller values make it more difficult.
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Check on to set the dolly-in or dolly-out point to be the mouse cursor. If not checked, the dolly-in or dolly-out point will
be the origin (0, 0, 0). If is also checked, takes precedence—the point of interest will be the dolly focus if it is visible in the active window.
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Check on or off the visibility of the Point of Interest Manipulator. The default is off.
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Check on to set the dolly-in or dolly-out point to be the point of interest on screen. If checked off, the dolly point will
be the mouse cursor if is checked, or the origin if neither nor is checked.
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Check on if you want the View > Set Non Proportional View tool to use a selection box to determine the extent and center of the scaled view.
If checked off, the tool squishes and stretches the view interactively as you drag the mouse.This is the default.
Model Windows
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Check on or off the guidelines and numerical box that appear when you use the Transform > Move tool.
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Check to show the red, green, and blue XYZ axis marker in each modeling window.
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Specifies the level of transparency of the window title bars. A value of 0.0 is completely opaque, and a value of 1.0 is completely
transparent (letting you see the grid and model through the title bars).
Note
Although you can see the model through the title bars, you cannot pick it in that location.
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– The window background displays with no gradient.
– The window background displays with a gradient that is darker at the top than the bottom. This is the default.
– The window background displays with a centered gradient that is lighter in the middle.
Restart required for these values
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Controls which axis is “up and down”, that is, perpendicular to the ground plane. Different computer graphics industries sometimes
use different conventions for whether Z or Y is “up”. Generally, Z is used for the “up” axis in industrial design.
Modeling
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– The layers display any name that you choose for them. By default they are called L1, L2, L3, and so on.
– The layers are labelled with a numeral, in the order in which they are created: #1, #2, #3, and so on. These numbers cannot
be changed.
– The layers display both their number and name. Only the layer name is editable (by double-clicking on it).
Paint
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Choose Low, Medium, or High.
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Check on or off to display or hide the brush preview. When the is turned on, the cursor displays a preview image of how the brush will apply paint to the sketch.
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Check to show white crosshairs centered on the brush’s midpoint.
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Select one of the following options to display or hide the brush outline:
– Do not display brush outline
– Display brush outline except when creating a stroke of paint
– Always display brush outline
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Sets the amount of time (in seconds) that it will take before the windows reappear. Choose a value between 0.00 and 10.00
seconds.
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The distance in pixels within which a brush will snap to a curve when curve snapping is on, from 4 to 128. The default is
25.
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Sets the size (in pixels) of any new canvases that are created. The default width is 842 pixels.
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Sets the size (in pixels) of any new canvases that are created. The default height is 595 pixels.
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Specifies what type of canvas is created when you start sketching in a Perspective window with no canvases.
– The option window appears so that you can choose the type of canvas and canvas parameters. This is the default.
– A standard canvas of default width and height is always created.
– An overlay canvas of default width and height is always created.
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Check this option to see the image layer thumbnails in the .
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Visualization
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Relative size of the shader sample thumbnails in the Control Panel.
– Fits three thumbnails across the panel.
– Fits two thumbnails across the panel.
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The location of the library of shaders that will appear in the Control Panel.
This location can also be specified by using the menu at the top of the Visualize Control Panel.
If this field is blank, a default library is used.
Animation
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Choose one of
- Line
- Round
- Pyramid
- Proportional
- Triangular
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Check this option to attach a tab bar to the bone axis. It also helps you to detect if the bone is flipped
System
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(Windows only) Choose or , depending whether you want to search for files using the default or the . The Windows file browser lets you store up to eight frequently used paths in the GO menu. This option only appears in the
Windows window.
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Check if you want to include a snapshot of the current window with any saved file. If checked OFF, then no .ICON preivew snapshot
will be created, but any previous files with .ICON files will still show their preview snapshot in both Alias and Windows
dile browsers.
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Set the directory for CheckPoint files to be stored. For more information about CheckPoint files, see File > Checkpoint. If this string is left blank, the directory defaults to current_project/wire/Checkpoints.
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Set the directory for files to be stored in the event of Alias terminating abnormally. If this string is left blank, the default is current_project/wire/_M.SAVES.
Restart required for these values
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The location of the Alias online help. This can be a file system path or a URL. For example:
/CDROM/html
file:///c:/Docs/Alias/Help
http://webserver/docs/Alias/Help
You must set this option to open the online help from the menu.
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The location of a library of digital resources, such as shaders or wire files. This path is available as the menu item in the file browser.
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The directory deleted files are moved to. If you do not type an absolute path, the path is relative to your user_data directory.
In Windows, this defaults to the Recycle Bin.
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This option specifies the location that Alias will use as scratch disk space. If it is checked (default), the user’s temporary directory is used. If it is unchecked, you
can choose another location using the field below. The files that Alias creates in the scratch directory are automatically cleared when you exit the software.
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Type the path to the location that you want to use as scratch disk space, or use the Browse button.
Miscellaneous
General Undo
The two checkboxes control how (or whether) Alias limits the amount of memory it uses to remember undoable events. You turn on one, both, or neither limit.
In general, using the memory limit is better at conserving memory. However, if you sometimes perform commands on large data
sets and you want to make sure you will always be able to undo them no matter how much memory they use, use the command limit
instead.
Tip
In the long run, it is always preferable to increase the amount of memory in your computer, if possible, than to lose the
ability to undo.
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Check if you want to reduce the amount of memory used to keep track of actions that can be undone. If checked, the Maximum
undos slider becomes available.
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Check to limit the operations that can be undone based on RAM. If checked, the Maximum memory slider becomes available.
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If you have chosen to limit the number of undo operations that can be performed, choose a number between 0 (no undo operations)
and 100.
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Allows you to limit the amount of RAM that will be allocated for Undo operations. The available range is 0 megabytes (no memory
allocated for Undo operations) to 500 megabytes. The default is 300 megabytes.
Restart required for these values
These next two options contain the search path(s) that are used to locate and load plug-ins into Alias.
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Print Brief or Full messages to the error log (Utilities > Errlog) while loading/unloading plug-ins.
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The path(s) that are searched for plug-ins. Separate paths on the lines with colons (:). Paths are searched in order.