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862 Chapter 22: Customizing the User Interface
Enter ing Commands by
Usi ng Mou se St rokes
Customize menu > Preferences > Preference Settings
dialog > Viewports tab > M ouse Control group > Stroke
Strokes are a way to assign command shortcuts
to mouse or tablet drag patterns. For many
operations,strokesaremoreconvenientthan
keyboard shortcuts because they can select an
object and apply a command to it.
For example, you can assign Arc Rotate to a
downward strok e. When you draw this stroke,
thesoftwarechangestoArcRotatemode. You
can assig n a circular stroke to the Hide Selected
command so that it both selects the objects and
then hides all the objects in the bounding extents
of the stroke pattern.
Yo u c a n u s e s t r o k e s i n t w o w a y s :
• If you ha ve a middle mouse button, you can
define and use strokes by specifying the Stroke
optionforthemiddlemousebuttoninthe
View por ts tab (page 3–821) of the Customize
menu > Preferences dialog.
• Todefineandusestrokeswiththeleftmouse
button, use the Strokes utility (page 3–868) and
turn on Draw Strokes.
Using the Keyboard with Strok es
Thesamestrokepatterncanperformfourdifferent
functions by holding
Shi f t , Alt ,or Shif t+Alt
when drawing the stroke:
•Drawingaverticallineisonetypeofstroke.
•Holding
Shif t whiledrawingthesamelineis
another type.
•Holding
Alt while drawing it is a third type.
•Holdingboth
Shif t and Alt while draw ing
thelineisafourthtype.
Holding
Ct rl whiledrawingastrokeindicates
that you want to define a new st roke, r ather
than use an existing stroke.
Note: Changes you make to the set of strokes are
saved with 3ds Max and persist from session
to session.
See also
Defining Strokes (page 3–863)
Rev iewing and Editing Strokes (page 3–865)
Stroke Preferences D ialog (page 3–867)
Strokes Utility (page 3–868)
Procedures
To def ine and use str ok es with t he mi ddle mouse
button:
1.
Choose Customize menu > Preferences >
Preference Settings dialog > Viewports tab.
2. In the Mouse Control group, turn on Stroke.
YoumustturnonthisoptionforallStroke
functions to work with the middle mouse
button.
3. Holdthemiddlemousebuttonanddragina
viewporttomakeastroke.Ifthestrokehasn’t
been defined, a dialog appears where you can
click Define to define the stroke. If the stroke
has already been defined, the corresponding
function is executed.
See Defining Strokes (page 3–863) for
information on defining and editing strokes.
To define and use str okes with t he left mouse button:
1.
Choose Utilities panel > Utilities rollout >
More button > Utilities dialog > Strokes.
2. Turn on D raw St rokes.
3. Hold the left mouse button and drag in a
viewporttomakeastroke.Ifthestrokehasn’t
been defined, a dialog appears where you can