BLENDER Feedback

[avaktar]

First of all, I want to say that your support of Blender is phenomenal and forward-thinking. You even beat out a lot of other commercial products that need drivers (Vue, Bryce, ZBrush? to name a few). I have a few bugs to report.

I am running on the Windows XP platform using the August-01-2007 build, using a Navigator PE. With a default configuration, these are the things I have noticed:

Environment Setup: No alteration to blender configuration (defaults upon installation). Navigator PE is configured with "Button1" and "Button2" as instructed for Blender. All other settings are default (zoom direction is the radio button option on the right, "Pan").

Camera Movement (Turntable mode)

1. In Turntable mode, the Pull/Push (vertical) axis, which is Z in blender, gets reversed. Pulling up or pushing down whether in Fly or Turntable modes should work the same. (I verified that with MMB, motion is the same in both modes).

Button 1 (Left) Behavior in Edit Mode - Zoom Direction settings for Y and Z are swapped

2. Movement is inverted from my driver settings (which are default):
a) Go into edit mode (tab) and select a single vertice on the cube (RMB). Blender should be in grab mode (I have the manipulator widget CTRL-SPACE-1 enabled).
b) Click the left button on the 3DX Navigator until 6d0f reports "transform" mode is active.
BUGS:
c) Pulling Up/Pushing Down on the 3DX erroneously moves the point along the Y axis (the Y axis in many 3D applications is vertical, but in Blender it is depth; eg, XY is top-down). It should move the point up and down on the Z axis.
d) Panning forward/back on the 3DX erroneously moves the point along the Z axis (translate on the vertical) when in fact it should move it on the Y.
e) Selecting the Pull/Push (first option) in the Zoom Direction portion of device configuration sets the behavior as I would have expected, but now my camera movement won't make sense -- in otherwords, in edit mode, the Zoom directions are reversed.

Button 1 (Left) Behavior in Transform Mode - Toggle should be released when Escape key is pressed or when non-select mouse-button is pressed

a) Select a vertice in edit mode
b) Press left 3DX navigator (button 1) to select point
c) Escape does not untoggle the button and undo the alterations (see next bug)

Button 1 (Left) Behavior in Transform mode - Must act like Toggle so Undo and Escape work as expected

a) While in Edit mode, select a vertice
b) Press left 3DX navigator (button 1) to select "transform"
c) Move the point around with the navigator, for a bit
d) Press left button1 again to return to a camera mode.
e) Try to undo. Hold CTRL-Z down for a while and watch the "animation" of the point as it steps through the rapid commits that the driver must have been making.
EXPECTED: Transform mode must have a toggle ability -- in other words, one more step in the cycle of Turntable->Fly->Transform rotation: Commit. In other words, entering transform mode should begin object translation, but if ESCAPE or RMB are pressed these should cancel the transform and return the object to its initial state (thus, nothing committed). Otherwise, another click on Button1 should COMMIT the translation and return to Fly/Turntable mode, so that if UNDO is used, it can return to the initial state.

Right now, any transformations with the navigator fill up the undo buffer with tons of commits.

Speed
I have to adjust the driver's "Overall Speed" nearly to maximum (2 click-stops away) to achieve a reasonable working speed. The driver should probably have a higher default internally for blender.


Overall, for an alpha release I'd say it's a fantastic first effort, and I am looking forward to continued testing, improvement and feedback.

Thanks!

[avaktar]

My bug for Turntable mode: I've just noticed that all the controls get reversed. The feeling is not intuitive as it is with the mouse.

View Rotation: Around Selection
The "View Rotation: Around Selection" option in Blender's Vew&Controls configuration isn't obeyed. This in fact is very helpful to the turntable navigation style.

Often (after performing a transformation), zoom broken in turntable

After I perform a transformation, my zoom (in and out) is usually not functioning anymore, but the remaining axes are ok. I was able to get it to begin responding to zoom again only once, somehow by changing modes and toggling trackball/turntable via Blender's View&Controls. However, I usually stay stuck where I can no longer zoom in turntable.

[avaktar]

OooOooooh... source code.

If I manage to make some useful changes, where can I submit them?

[avaktar]

More on the turntable zoom in/out bug

If I go into turntable (as stated before), I can't zoom in (push up) or out (pull back), but I found tonight if I change my view with the mouse, the Navigator suddenly responds correctly and I can zoom in and out. (This work around worked intermittently for an hour, until finally that particular window just stopped responding to zoom altogether, even from the mouse!)

[rompelstilchen]

More on the turntable zoom in/out bug

If I go into turntable (as stated before), I can't zoom in (push up) or out (pull back), but I found tonight if I change my view with the mouse, the Navigator suddenly responds correctly and I can zoom in and out. (This work around worked intermittently for an hour, until finally that particular window just stopped responding to zoom altogether, even from the mouse!)

lol, i can only zoom in zoom back

[avaktar]

Blender 2.46 has been released with the 3dconnexion support, but it is just as horrible as it was in the beta. You really have to play with the driver settings to get the responsiveness. I'm going to play with several of the areas where I reported perceived bugs in the past and see if any improvements have surfaced.