The Asset View displays each individual asset that may cause a new object to be loaded into the scene, modify an object that is already in the scene, or trigger various other actions. When a category is selected in the associated Category View, the Asset View displays the assets assigned to that specific category or one of its subcategories. For example, if the “Props” category is selected, the Asset View might display a lamp as well as pottery, sports equipment, furniture, etc.
Information about each asset can be found on the Information Panel Info page when an asset is selected.
For more specific detail related to how the assets are displayed and what the various decorations mean, see the Results section.
This area of the view provides options for filtering items based on a specific keyword, or set of keywords; clearing any keywords that may have been entered; accessing and managing saved filters; and displaying information about the number of matching results as well as a busy status.
The Filter Menu Button provides consistent and convenient access to a menu populated with actions that pertain specifically to the text entered into the Filter Field. Clicking the button causes the Filter Menu to display.
The Filter Menu provides access to installed and/or user-created filters, along with the actions that provide access to saving and/or managing custom filters.
Clicking a Filter in the Filter Menu replaces the contents of the Filter Field with the text of that filter.
Clicking the Save Filter… action, near the bottom of the Filter Menu, causes a “Save Filter” dialog to be displayed.
The Save Filter dialog provides options for defining the Menu Path, as well as the Filter Name. The selector at the end of the Menu Path field is populated by any existing menu paths. Selecting a path from the list will replace the contents of the Menu Path field with the chosen value. The Filter Name field provides the ability to name the filter—the value of which must not contain characters that are not permitted, by the operating system, within file names. Once a valid Filter Name has been entered, the Accept button becomes enabled. Clicking the Accept button causes the dialog to disappear and the word or phrase entered into the Filter Field to be saved as an option in the Filter Menu for future use.
The Manage Filters… action is used to launch an OS file browser window and opens to the folder that user-created filters are stored in. Which folder is opened depends on the type of items represented by the associated view.
The structure of the folders and files that reside within this folder directly correspond to the menus and filters displayed in the Filter Menu. Each page and/or pane uses a different set of filters, depending on the type of item represented by the associated view. These filter sets are stored in folders that exist parallel to the opened folder. As changes are made to the structure and/or contents of these folders, the same changes are automatically reflected in the Filter Menu the next time it is shown.
Entering a keyword into the Filter Field reduces the list of items to display. For instance, inserting the word “sword” into the field causes a search for items with the keyword “sword” associated with them and then displays only those items in the Results View.
Insert brief description and link to Advanced Filtering (e.g., Advanced Filtering).
The Clear Filter button clears any keywords entered into the Filter Field. Note that this option only appears when text has been entered into the Filter Field.
The Range Indicator displays how many items meet a specific criteria. For instance, if the selected category has nine results in it, the indicator would display 1–9. Similarly, if a keyword were then entered into the Filter Field, and only four of the results had that keyword associated with them, 1–4 would be displayed instead.
When a different category is selected in the Category View, the range changes to display how many items are associated with that specific category—the same applies to changing which keyword is entered into the Filter Field. If no results meet the current criteria, or no criteria has been defined—i.e., no category is selected—the indicator will display 0–0.
The Progress Indicator shows the status of a query into the content database. This indicator only becomes visible when the application must filter through a large enough set of records in the database to find results. The indicator is animated to signify that the application is busy or “in progress” and not stalled.
Use the Sorting Selector to change the order that items are displayed in the Results View. Click the selector to display a list of sorting options, then choose an item in the list to reorder the displayed results.
The sort order options include:
When viewing either the Files or Products page, the Results View on the right displays the results of what is selected and filtered for in the Category View on the left. For example, if the “Accessories” category is selected in the Category View, the results displayed are either assets that are accessories when the Files page is selected or products that contain assets that are accessories when the Products page is selected. Results are displayed as items that have an icon and a label. Asset icons are square, while product icons are rectangular.
Each item displays an image, referred to as its Icon, to aide in visually distinguishing one item from another. These icons are typically in PNG (Portable Network Graphics) format. An item lacking an icon displays a Notice indicator in place of an icon.
Asset icons are named identically to the file that the asset represents, with the exception of the file extension, and reside in the same folder on disk as the file. For an asset named Example.duf, its icon would be named Example.png or Example.duf.png. If the name of the icon does not include the extension of the corresponding file in its name (i.e., Example.png), that icon will be displayed for the assets of any files in the path that do not have icons with names that do include their respective extensions (i.e, Example.dsa). However, if the name of the icon does include the extension of the corresponding file in its name (i.e, Example.dsa.png), the asset for that file will use that icon.
Optionally, assets posses the ability to display an alternate icon in its Tool Tip when the cursor is hovered over the asset. If the file for an asset named Example.duf also has an icon named Example.tip.png, the tip icon will be displayed instead of the standard icon.
Each asset has the ability to display additional decorations on its icon to signify what kind of asset it is, offer a hint about its loading behavior, how it might be used, and/or membership in a group. Indicators are typically represented in the form of labels and/or glyphs that overlay the corners of the icon.
If an icon for an asset is missing, a triangle with an exclamation point (“!”) surrounded by a frame appears and signals that the image for that asset's icon could not be found on disk. This notice appears in the center of where the icon would normally be. When the file for an asset is missing, a notice will appear in the lower left corner of where the icon would normally be. In the event that both the icon and the file are missing, both notices will appear.
A Companion File is a file in a native format, which is named identically to an asset of an imported file type1), that resides in the same folder on disk as the asset file it is a companion for, with the exception of file extension. Companion files can exist in the form of a native script (.dsa, .dsb, .dse) or a DSON format asset (.duf); however, an asset is only allowed to have one companion file. If a native script and a DSON file both exist within the folder of an asset of an imported type, preference is given to the native script2).
Companion scripts typically contain conditional logic that must be evaluated and can be used to present options to the user or make decisions based on the state of the application, the contents of the scene, node selection states, etc. DSON format assets do not contain complex logic and their data can simply be loaded in a native way instead of executed.
The Content Type of an asset is represented by a label and a color:
Native format assets typically offer options that change the loading behavior of the asset. See Control-Freak for more information.
Pressing and holding the [Alt] key ([Option] on OS X) on the keyboard while clicking and dragging an asset icon that loads an object into the Viewport will display a target that can be used to control where the asset is loaded when dropped. The center of the target will be interpreted as the World origin for the loading of that asset.
Assigning a Group to an item marks that item using colors and/or shapes and serves to establish user-definable collections or associations—much like using a highlighter on a page in a book or attaching stickers to objects in a room to draw attention to some form of relationship between the marked passages/items. By default, the application provides two distinct groups: None and New.
The list of available groups is designed to be extensible by end users but has a few rules that must be followed:
Regardless of their respective sizes, the PNG images will overlay and be anchored to the bottom right corner of the icon of the item to which they are assigned.
Note: Groups are currently only added to the menu when the application launches. This may change in a future version.
The Label is the word or phrase displayed directly beneath the icon, like Michael 6 or Genesis 2 Female Base. In the case of a product, the label is typically the name of the product or a subset thereof. In the case of an asset, the label is typically descriptive of what the asset is and can often include what side of the body it was created for and may also contain a pattern of characters that signifies membership in a collection. For instance, a dagger prop label might state “left” or “LHand” in the label to indicate it was designed for the left hand of a figure.
Right-clicking on an asset displays a context menu of options relating to that asset (or the set of selected assets). These options include: