Tool shortcut keys

I don’t understand that, if you don’t use keyboard (because you don’t want to remember the hotkeys or you are using a tablet PC). What is the use of changing the shortcuts to have piemenus (that you must learn each shortcut and each piemenu, double work) or active tools, if you also do not use the shortcuts?

If you’re not going to use a keyboard, it won’t do much good to change the hotkeys.

What solutions give Maya/Modo/Max/Cinema4D to work without a keyboard? Because better solution than blender 2.79, with all the options at hand of a tablet with T-shelf… I don’t see.

1 Like

it is terribly annoying that the panel appears with the whole list of tools while you are selecting a tool through shortcut.

but you imagine this situation in 7-8 hours of continuous modeling with this panel that will continuously flicker in front of the eyes?
do you want to become epileptic ???

came on guys, do miracles and then lose in these obviousness?

I have nothing against the combination of two shortcuts to activate the new tools, but the fact that I constantly see the list of tools as a popup I find it unnerving, especially because they are fast tools and distract me from work …just to give a somewhat comic example … of the thing

the point is not to over-load the keyboard, provide the tool and let the users decide which shortcuts are useful, not every single option needs a damn hotkey which might conflict with what user need and he can’t change it because it will break other parts,the pie menus/menus are useful to provide multiple options which reduce clicks immensely, of course not everything should have pie menus…other apps give users minimal keymap so he/she can add what fits his work best and not force them to use what ships with the software also (like in maya) easy way to stack up (tools/commands…etc) in the shelf panel, removing even the need of assigning hotkeys for them this is 10x faster.

Yes please.
I almost forgot about this big issue. :+1:

1 Like

SO why they are not?
I always wonder why D doesn’t activate the annotation tool instead of the annotation modal.
billrey, sorry for rejecting most of your ideas but there’s a lot of biased changes in blender I would like to not have happened, please don’t target blender to an audience, blender is supposed to be a democratic tool.

I would like to re-ask a few quality of life reversions to blender.

  • Manipuators shouldnt be tools, they are in the first layer of interaction, almost like the hand of the modeler. It should be active along with any other tool.

  • Bring back number row brushes shortcuts. Its almost impossible to setup it correctly with the keymap editor and the numbers are the easiest way to reach brushes.

as a final consideration.

Right keymap is faster, evey experienced blender user can guarantee that. so why force newbies to use Left? I say force but I mean “not letting know”, no one likes to mess the defaults, we assume the default is better, a configuration wizard is not enough, everyone does Next>Next>Next>Done without even looking, there should be preferentially something like a popup “You must choose the selection mode before continue” therefore, giving the newbie the awareness of the Right click mode, letting a chance for a conscient choice…

2 Likes

I reasoned on the spacebar use as a switch between select mode and modal tools and it would not be so bad if you did not appear every time the popup, but only act as a switch …
and even the combination of shortcuts to navigate between the various transformation tools is not bad …
instead
I’m not convinced by the use of the new modeling tools with the combination of shortcuts that use the spacebar

I do not know…
I think we should make a better merging between the classic method and the new tools,
two totally different and totally independent modes confuse …

at the base of all there should be the fact that the old users, knowing the philosophy of operation of blender, find natural and intuitive some functions (the combo shortcuts … s + x ,r - z, etc…) also for the new tools…

for the new users, once the problems of the incongruities with the left click select are solved, and with the industy standard shortcuts, they will not have too many problems to adapt to the philosophy of using the shortcuts combo in the tools … actually, I have seen videos in around new users come from other software who discovered the combo keys and found them powerfull … as it really is.

Yeah, I know, but unfortunately this is a little slow. We need direct shortcuts to the active tools.
Coming from other apps, I actually don’t want to deal with the modal tools at all, that’s why I wish we had a preference to turn them off, so we could use the active tools with the usual shortcuts.

3 Likes

I don’t think the option is bad, but I’ve never understood why people who know how modal tools work prefer active tools.

The biggest problem of the modal tools is to know the hotkey, once known they work better than the active tools. The active tools are much more uncomfortable except when you use the same tool several times at once. That’s the weirdest thing. The active tools force you to leave the mouse pressed constantly to make the transformation, which tires enormously in the forearm after 8 hours working. On the other hand, manners only need one click to confirm, and not have constantly pressed any button, which makes it much more comfortable to use the keyboard for the rest of actions.

I didn’t notice any difference in the delay between press and click events.

Anyway, do you have some plans to improve active tools way to work? I mean

  • Delete select active tools from T-Shelf
  • Implement select active tools by default inside any tool (like actually but with a few improvements)
  • Put Move/rotate/scale like “pasive active tools” that always are selected
  • When the user click in other active tool left the transform active tool in “background” and when user click ESC go back to the transform tool.

¿?

I have tried the same in windows, the delay in macos is less than in windows. Some reason to this?

Right, it could not show the popup and work more like a regular shortcut (this is something we discussed).

This makes it much less discoverable though.

It’s possible to do both - spacemacs leader key does this, using a delay, so if you don’t press anything it shows the options, otherwise pressing a second key quickly performs the action with no visual hints.

I’m not against having some changes like this, it just seems like a detail which isn’t high priority at the moment when tool switching is already working.

I’m grateful that I’m not the only one to have noticed this “continuous popup annoyance” that distract from workflow

Capture

I mentioned this in the paper cuts thread too, but what tool tips?

And when I search for “Move” in the Keymap preferences, I find it only in the grease pencil.

1 Like

Right click mode had its chance for the last, was it 25 years Blender recently celebrated? It had its chance. The industry rejected it. If you want to be a superior Dvorak keyboard user, there’s nothing stopping you, though. :wink:

1 Like

Yeah, you have set the “Spacebar Action” to “Search”, if you try “Play” or “Tools” there will be tooltips.

Not the industry, people, human brains rejected it. I assume, I rejected blender first time I met it (2.4) only because of right click, you know what, after learning to use right click, is the standard windows keymap that seems awkward to me.

1 Like

“Manipulators shouldn’t be tools”

I agree with this wholeheartedly.
The active tools being modal adds a different kind of workflow to Blender and although I’m not a fan, it’s useful. So I can understand them being decoupled from the shortcuts.
But not the transform tools - they should be coupled and work the same with button and shortcut - and I should be able to turn off just their gizmos as I could (and did) in 2.7x

1 Like

I am new to blender and the first version that I have been using so far is 2.80 (but I have tried earlier versions in the past). I would like the icons on the left toolbar to be switched whenever I press hotkeys.

Because, it’s currently really confusing when you press C (Circle Select tool) to see the Box-Select tool icon still showing on the toolbar. It looks like a bug or a not-implemented feature to me.

Is there a way to to circumvent this strange behaviour?
Thank you.

1 Like

Set the “Spacebar” action to Tool, in the keymap preferences, then Space-C sets circle-select.

This works both tapping Space, then pressing C, or holding space like a modifier.

Other bindings are displayed when pressing space.

1 Like

Thanks for the tip. Unfortunately, displaying/using this menu is slower than directly using hotkeys. That’s why I would prefer the Tools (of the left toolbar) to be directly activated when I press hotkeys.

1 Like