Old Pre-Selection button configuration? (NX5)

[morans]

Hello, I was curious to see if there is a way to setup pre-selection to the way it was in NX3 and below. Not necessarily for the icons, but for the mouse clicks.

For instance, in NX3 and prior... pressing the first mouse button cycled through the features and pressing the middle mouse button selected the feature that was highlighted.

In NX5 it's the exact opposite, and old habits die hard as they say. No matter how many times I try to remind myself that it's opposite, I keep doing it the old way (it doesnt help that we still use NX3 for a different customer) and mucking up my selections.

So with that said, how can I get the old pre-selection mouse button scheme back?

thanks
Steve

 

[hudson888]

Probably not since NX-6 is already set to make way for NX-7 meaning that it would doubtless be too late. For those who still remember some days I still pine for the old CTRL-MB1 selection method, but that died back when UG was still UG!

Best Regards

Hudson

www.jamb.com.au

Nil Desperandum illegitimi non carborundum

 

[JohnRBaker]

I assume that you're talking about the behavior of 'QuickPick'. And actually, NO, there is no way to change it back since it was technically not working correctly and I think if you'll follow along here and try it yourself, you'll see what I mean.

To start with, in NX 3 and prior releases, the behavior of selecting say a feature was inconsistent depending on whether you were selecting from the Screen/Part Navigator or using 'QuickPick', and we should have caught this when we first implemented QuickPick, but for whatever reason we didn't which was our mistake. When selecting from the Screen or from the Part Navigator the action is to either double-click with MB1 (Left Button), or single select with MB1 and then use MB3 to select the desired actions, such as edit. And if after a single MB1 select, you were to press MB2, it would have then pre-selected the NEXT object within the pick area. Now this interactive behavior has NOT changed in at least 20 years or so and continues to the latest releases of NX and no one has ever suggested that we make any changes when NOT using QuickPick. Are we agreed on this?

However, the problem with NX 3 and prior releases, is that when using QuickPick the user interaction was pressing MB1 triggered the QuickPick 'list' but pressing MB1 the second time moved the pre-selection to the next item where you had to press MB2 to actually make the selection, which was completely opposite of what it was when NOT using QuickPick:

No QuickPick - MB1: Select Item - MB2: Highlight Next Item

With QuickPick - MB1: Highlight Next Item - MB2: Select Item

So starting with NX 4 we changed both the appearance, and behavior of QuickPick. In addition to adding the filtering options (since starting in NX 4 we also did away with Selection 'Modes' and went with Selection 'Priorities'), we also changed the behavior of depending on which mouse button you used next. So now pressing MB1 triggered QuickPick and pressing it again performed the selection, as a sort of 'slow-motion' double-click, while MB2 moves the pre-selection to the next item, which is again consistent with the on-screen interaction:

No QuickPick - MB1: Select Item - MB2: Highlight Next Item

With QuickPick - MB1: Select Item - MB2: Highlight Next Item


And if that was not enough of a reason to switch the MB1/MB2 behavior, once the QuickPick was an actual 'list', we could now use a wheel-equipped mouse to move up and down the list and since generally speaking, the 'wheel' is also MB2, this only makes sense to have a single push of MB2 advance the list highlight whereas using the MB2 'wheel' would perform a dynamical advance the highlighting of items.

So if you were to start using NX 4 and then were to use NX 3, your first impression would be that QuickPick was backward. It would be so obvious you would wonder why it had ever been implemented in that manner in the first place. There would be a 100% consensus that it was a 'bug', and therefore why would anyone want to go back to what is now so obvious a mistaken implementation. Granted, we should have caught this years ago and made the changes then, but...

John R. Baker, P.E.
Product 'Evangelist'
Product Design Solutions
Siemens PLM Software Inc.
Cypress, CA

http://www.siemens.com/plm

http://www.plmworld.org/museum/

To an Engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

 

[cowski]

Steve,
I agree that after years of being conditioned by one method it is difficult to change habits, but after only 3+ months now I actually prefer the 'new' method. I occasionally have to open up NX2 so I share your frustration with changing something so basic as picking entities.

I guess I rationalized the mb2 as the 'apply' button ie cycle through the available entities with mb1 then 'ok/apply' my selection with mb2, much like it is used in the feature creation dialogs. John's explanation makes a lot of sense; I really like the list and being able to scroll through with the wheel. Stick with it - eventually the old method will seem strange.