checkbox and eval?

[Robert Bateman]

add in some objExists/attributeExists calls to your menu commands.

[cgbeige]

can you have if (objExists ) stuff in menu commands? Could you post some example code?

[NaughtyNathan]

a menu command is really nothing more than a block of MEL code, so you can do literally anything inside it. However, menuItems with checkboxes or radio buttons are slightly more complicated than this because once a menuItem is created it is static, and does not update (automatically!). The -cb and -rb flags are only significant on initial creation of the menuItem. This means that when you create the menuItem the checkbox will accurately reflect the attribute status, but it will never change/update unless you change it manually. If, for example, the user changes the attribute manually on the node your menuItem will be out of sync.
The best way around this is to use the menu -pmc flag when you create the menu. This defers the building of the menuItems to a global proc, which is called every time the menu is about to be opened. In this proc you can put as much `objExists` and attribute checking as you like.

global proc buildTestMenu()
{
menu -e -dai testMenuName; // EMPTY the menu!
setParent -m testMenuName;

int $isPersp = `objExists persp`;
int $isCam1 = `objExists camera1`;

int $pVis = ($isPersp) ? `getAttr persp.visibility` : 0 ;
int $cVis = ($isCam1) ? `getAttr camera1.visibility` : 0 ;

menuItem -en $isPersp -l "persp visible?" -cb $pVis;
menuItem -en $isCam1 -l "camera1 visible?" -cb $cVis;
}

{
global string $gMainWindow;
setParent $gMainWindow;

menu -l "test Menu" -p $gMainWindow -pmc "buildTestMenu" testMenuName;
setParent -m ..;
}


:nathaN

[cgbeige]

awesome - thanks again, Nathan.

[cgbeige]

hey Nathan,

I'm just getting into trying to incorporate this into my script and I'm wondering if you can explain the syntax here:

int $pVis = ($isPersp) ? `getAttr persp.visibility` : 0 ;
int $cVis = ($isCam1) ? `getAttr camera1.visibility` : 0 ;

I'm not clear on the ? and : usage.

[NaughtyNathan]

ah, sure.. this is just a natty shortcut trick that allows you to do an if..else condition as a single line, rather than several.

this should explain it better than I could:

http://download.autodesk.com/us/maya/2010help/files/Controlling_the_flow_of_a_script_operator.htm

:nathaN

[cgbeige]

ah okay thx

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