Disable merging (during tool operation)

[Eneroth3]

I've created several custom move tools. All of these have to preview the moved object with completely custom code if they are going to move edges and faces, traditionally a wireframe but more recently shaded and even textured polygons.

Components can be moved freely to follow the mouse cursor in the mouse move event, but edges and faces would stick and merge to any geometry you drag them over.

To make a custom modifier tool it would help a lot of you could temporarily disable the geometry merging until the user clicks to commit. This is similar to how SketchUp native tools work.

This also applies to any custom scale, rotate, pushpull (like Fredo's tools I'd imagine) and other modifier tools.

[thomthom]

I've been wondering if a new draw method would be useful for this. One where the polygons passed in are drawn using the current style.

Doing so would be faster than using temp entities.

[Eneroth3]

This isn't for temp entities but for modifying existing entities. A new way to draw to the view would work for drawing tools but not modifier tools. For a modifier tool (transform tool) you need to prevent the thing you are modifying from being drawn in its original place. Also there can be sticky geometry connected to the thing you modify that would be difficult to emulate. I think the cleanest solution for a SketchUp like UX without reinventing the wheel is to disable merging/intersecting. It could automatically reset at tool deactivation if we are afraid of devs leaving this state on.