Thanks

Hi @CJtheTiger primitives are generators that generate and holds a PolyonObject in there cache. So most of the time for simple primitive like a cube, to access its generated PolygonObject, you should first retrieve it's cache with the GetCache method. If you want a more indepth introduction to this topic please read SDK Example - Geometry Readme. Then if you want to cover more complex cases I suggest you to read geometry_caches Example. And if you want to visualize the cache and the scene structure I would highly recommend to take a look at the C++ Example - activeobject dialog. Finally regarding the spline creation, you can find all the information needed to create a spline in Python Example - SplineObject, if you have more question on the spline creation please open a new topic. Cheers, Maxime.

Hello @derekheisler, Welcome to the Plugin Café forum and the Cinema 4D development community, it is great to have you with us! Getting Started Before creating your next postings, we would recommend making yourself accustomed with our Forum and Support Guidelines, as they line out details about the Maxon SDK Group support procedures. Of special importance are: Support Procedures: Scope of Support: Lines out the things we will do and what we will not do. Support Procedures: Confidential Data: Most questions should be accompanied by code but code cannot always be shared publicly. This section explains how to share code confidentially with Maxon. Forum Structure and Features: Lines out how the forum works. Structure of a Question: Lines out how to ask a good technical question. It is not mandatory to follow this exactly, but you follow the idea of keeping things short and mentioning your primary question in a clear manner. About your First Question Please excuse the slight delay and thank you for the community answer provided by @HerrMay. The core misconception in your code lies in the line objs = doc.GetObjects(), as it does not get a list of all objects in doc, but only the root level objects. Users are expected to do scene graph traversal on their own at the moment, there is no method which would do it for you. There are also other problems with your code, as for example trying to instantiate a BaseThread or using CallCommand (not a real problem but not recommended in most cases). There have been also multiple similar threads in the past: How do you collapse complex dependencies in order?: This is about implementing a connect and delete. How to traverse a GeListNode Tree?: This is about hierarchical traversal, i.e., getting all descendants and siblings for a node. There is also something that I would call branch traversal, it is much more complex and we have talked about it for example here. CAD Normal Tag flipped: Entirely different topic, but could give you an idea on how to realize a simple GUI for this. Finde below a simple example. Cheers, Ferdinand Result: [image: 1680193792635-collapse.gif] Code: """Demonstrates how to collapse all SDS objects in a scene. One could also make this more fancy with a GUI and undo steps, I did not do this here. """ import c4d doc: c4d.documents.BaseDocument # The active document. def IterNodes(node: c4d.GeListNode) -> c4d.GeListNode: """Yields all descendants and next-siblings of `node` in a semi-iterative fashion. """ if node is None: return while node: yield node # The recursion moving down. for descendant in IterNodes(node.GetDown()): yield descendant # The iteration in one level. node = node.GetNext() def Collapse(objects: list[c4d.BaseObject]) -> None: """Collapses all items in #objects as individual root nodes into singular objects. This function mimics the behaviour of the builtin (but unexposed) "Connect & Delete" command by first running the "CSTO" and then "JOIN" command. With setups complex enough, this can still fail due to the non-existent dependency graph of the classic API (when one does CSTO things in the wrong order). In 99.9% of the cases this will not be the case, but one should get the inputs with #GETACTIVEOBJECTFLAGS_SELECTIONORDER as I did below to give the user more control. (or alternatively do not batch operate). """ if len(objects) < 1: raise RuntimeError() doc: c4d.documents.BaseDocument = objects[0].GetDocument() doc.StartUndo() # CSTO all local hierarchies in #objects and replace these root nodes with their collapsed # counter parts. result = c4d.utils.SendModelingCommand(c4d.MCOMMAND_CURRENTSTATETOOBJECT, objects, c4d.MODELINGCOMMANDMODE_ALL, c4d.BaseContainer(), doc, c4d.MODELINGCOMMANDFLAGS_NONE) if not result or len(result) != len(objects): raise RuntimeError() for old, new in zip(objects, result): parent, pred = old.GetUp(), old.GetPred() doc.AddUndo(c4d.UNDOTYPE_DELETEOBJ, old) old.Remove() doc.InsertObject(new, parent, pred) doc.AddUndo(c4d.UNDOTYPE_NEWOBJ, new) # Join the CSTO results root by root object, and then replace the CSTO results with the final # collapsed result. JOIN is a bit weird when it comes to transforms, so we must store the # transform of the to be joined object, then zero it out, and finally apply it to the joined # result again. for obj in result: mg: c4d.Matrix = obj.GetMg() obj.SetMg(c4d.Matrix()) joined = c4d.utils.SendModelingCommand(c4d.MCOMMAND_JOIN, [obj], c4d.MODELINGCOMMANDMODE_ALL, c4d.BaseContainer(), doc, c4d.MODELINGCOMMANDFLAGS_NONE) if not joined: raise RuntimeError() parent, pred = obj.GetUp(), obj.GetPred() doc.AddUndo(c4d.UNDOTYPE_DELETEOBJ, obj) obj.Remove() new: c4d.BaseObject = joined[0] new.SetMg(mg) doc.InsertObject(new, parent, pred) doc.AddUndo(c4d.UNDOTYPE_NEWOBJ, new) doc.EndUndo() c4d.EventAdd() def main() -> None: """Runs the example. """ # Find all SDS objects in the scene. objectList: list[c4d.BaseObject] = [ n for n in IterNodes(doc.GetFirstObject()) if n.CheckType(c4d.Osds)] # Collapse all SDS objects we have found. for obj in objectList: # We have to check if #obj is still a valid reference because we could have already # collapsed the object away in a prior iteration; sds-objects can live inside sds-objects. if not obj.IsAlive(): continue # Collapse the object. Collapse([obj]) c4d.EventAdd() if __name__ == "__main__": main()

Hello @kng_ito, Thank you for reaching out to us. Modifying the description of a node via NodeData.GetDDescription should only be done when NodeData.GetDEnabling is not sufficient. To hide a parameter, the field c4d.DESC_HIDE must be set to True. Find a simple example below. Cheers, Ferdinand Result: [image: 1680101928166-hide_param.gif] File: pc14487.zip Code: // The description defintion of the tag Texample. CONTAINER Texample { NAME Texample; INCLUDE Texpression; // The main "Tag" tab of the tag. GROUP ID_TAGPROPERTIES { // The element which is being hidden (or not). REAL ID_HIDDEN_ELEMENT { MIN 0.0; MAX 100.0; UNIT METER; STEP 0.001; CUSTOMGUI REALSLIDER; } // The parameter based on which the hidden element is shown or not. BOOL ID_HIDE_CONDITION {} } } """Implements a tag which dynamically hides and shows a parameter. """ import c4d import typing class ExampleTagData(c4d.plugins.TagData): """Implements a tag which dynamically hides and shows a parameter. """ # The plugin ID for the hook. ID_PLUGIN: int = 1060794 @classmethod def Register(cls) -> None: """Registers the plugin hook. """ if not c4d.plugins.RegisterTagPlugin( id=cls.ID_PLUGIN, str="Example Tag", info=c4d.TAG_EXPRESSION | c4d.TAG_VISIBLE, g=cls, description="texample", icon=c4d.bitmaps.InitResourceBitmap(c4d.Tdisplay)): print(f"Warning: Failed to register '{cls}' tag plugin.") def Init(self, node: c4d.GeListNode) -> bool: """Called to initialize a tag instance. Args: node: The BaseTag instance representing this plugin object. """ self.InitAttr(node, float, c4d.ID_HIDDEN_ELEMENT) self.InitAttr(node, bool, c4d.ID_HIDE_CONDITION) node[c4d.ID_HIDDEN_ELEMENT] = 50.0 node[c4d.ID_HIDE_CONDITION] = False return True def Execute(self, tag: c4d.BaseTag, doc: c4d.documents.BaseDocument, op: c4d.BaseObject, bt: c4d.threading.BaseThread, priority: int, flags: int) -> int: """Called when expressions are evaluated to let a tag modify a scene. Not used in this case. """ return c4d.EXECUTIONRESULT_OK def GetDDescription(self, node: c4d.GeListNode, description: c4d.Description, flags: int) -> typing.Union[bool, tuple[bool, int]]: """Called by Cinema 4D when the description of a node is being evaluated to let the node dynamically modify its own description. """ # Bail when the description cannot be not fully loaded. if not description.LoadDescription(node.GetType()): return False, flags # Define the ID of the parameter we want to modify and get the ID of the parameter which is # currently to be evaluated. paramId: c4d.DescID = c4d.DescID(c4d.DescLevel(c4d.ID_HIDDEN_ELEMENT, c4d.DTYPE_REAL, 0)) evalId: c4d.DescID = description.GetSingleDescID() # Bail when there is a to be evaluated parameter and our parameter is not part of or equal # to the evaluated parameter. if (evalId and not paramId.IsPartOf(evalId)): return True, flags # Get the description data container instance (GetParameter>I<) for the parameter we want to # modify. All changes made to the container will be directly reflected on the node. paramData: c4d.BaseContainer = description.GetParameterI(paramId) if paramData is None: return True, flags # Set the hidden state of the parameter ID_HIDDEN_ELEMENT based on the value of the # parameter ID_HIDE_CONDITION. paramData[c4d.DESC_HIDE] = node[c4d.ID_HIDE_CONDITION] return True, flags | c4d.DESCFLAGS_DESC_LOADED if __name__ == "__main__": ExampleTagData.Register()

Hello @HerrMay, Is the multiplication of a matrix with a vector (mg.off = mg * p) essentially the same what mg * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(vec) does? No, mg * p multiplies a matrix by a vector which will yield the transformed vector p'. mg * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(vec) on the other hand multiplies two matrices, yielding the combined transform of them, a new matrix. What would be equivalent to mg * p is mg * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(p) * c4d.Vetcor(0, 0, 0). Please note that the whole subject is also out of scope of support as declared in the forum guidelines. I understand that the subject is a common barrier for the more on the artist-sided leaning users of ours, and I help where I can, but we cannot teach you vector math, linear algebra, or however you want to label this subject. Find below a short code example. Cheers, Ferdinand Output: M = Matrix(v1: (1, 0, 0); v2: (0, 1, 0); v3: (0, 0, 1); off: (0, 100, 0)) p = Vector(100, 0, 0) M * p = Vector(100, 100, 0) M * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0)) = Matrix(v1: (1, 0, 0); v2: (0, 1, 0); v3: (0, 0, 1); off: (100, 100, 0)) M * c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0) = Vector(100, 100, 0) N * c4d.Vector( 0, 0, 0) = Vector(100, 100, 0) M * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(p) * c4d.Vector(0, 0, 0) = Vector(100, 100, 0) Code: import c4d # Let us assume #M to be the global matrix/transform of some object #op. View it as a tool to # transform a point in global space into the local coordinate system of #op. M: c4d.Matrix = c4d.Matrix(off=c4d.Vector(0, 100, 0)) # The matrix #M now has this form: # # | v1 1 0 0 | # The "x-axis" of the coordinate system defined by #M. # | v2 0 1 0 | # The "y-axis" of the coordinate system defined by #M. # | v3 0 0 1 | # The "z-axis" of the coordinate system defined by #M. # ---------------------- # | off 0 100 0 | # The origin of the coordinate system defined by #M. # # I.e., #M has the standard orientation and scale and only translates all things by 100 units # on the y-axis. So, the object #op would have the Euler angles (0°, 0°, 0°), the scale (1, 1, 1) # and the position (0, 100, 0) in world coordinates. # Define a vector #p to transform and print both #M and #p. p: c4d.Vector = c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0) print(f"{M = }") print(f"{p = }") # Transforming a point #p by a matrix #M will yield a point #q that is in the same relation to #M # as #p is to the global frame. q: c4d.Vector = M * p # #q will be the vector (100, 100, 0) because , (100, 100, 0) and #M are the same relation as #p # and the identity matrix are, a.k.a., the world frame. In a less technical way, (0, 100, 0) is the # origin of the coordinate system defined by #M. And to express #p in a manner as if #M would be # its coordinate system, we have to add (0, 100, 0), because that is the new origin. For orientation # and scale it works more or less the same, I would recommend having a look at the Matrix manual or # Wikipedia article on the subject. print (f"{M * p = }") # We can construct new transforms in many ways (again, Matrix Manual :)), one of them is by # combining multiple transforms via matrix multiplication. # We "add" the translation transform (100, 0, 0) to #M. Note that matrix multiplication is not # commutative, i.e., "M * N = N * M" does not always hold true. In this case it would because only # translations are involved. N: c4d.Matrix = M * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0)) print(f"{M * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0)) = }") # To get the same point as #q when multiplying a point #r with #N, we must pick the null-vector # because the origin of #N is already at where M * (100, 0, 0) is. print (f"{M * c4d.Vector(100, 0, 0) = }") print (f"{N * c4d.Vector( 0, 0, 0) = }") # We can also do it in one operation: print (f"{M * c4d.utils.MatrixMove(p) * c4d.Vector(0, 0, 0) = }")

While rethinking about it last night, it may not be that slow if on user interaction you just flush the main group and re-attach already existing dialog. So you need to modify your `def _DrawQuickTabGroup(self)`` method like so to only display visible dialog: def _DrawQuickTabGroup(self, onlyVisible=True): """ Creates and draws all the SubDialog for each tab, take care it does not hide these according to a selection state. Returns: True if success otherwise False. """ # Checks if the quicktab is defined if self._quickTab is None: return False activeIds, activeNames = self.GetActiveTabs() # Flush the content of the group that holds all ours SubDialogs self.LayoutFlushGroup(ID_MAINGROUP) #self.GroupBorderSpace(left=5, top=5, right=5, bottom=5) # Iterates over the number of tab to create and attach the correct SubDialog for tabId, (tabName, tabGui) in enumerate(self._tabList.items()): toDisplay = tabId in activeIds if not toDisplay: continue self.AddSubDialog(ID_QUICKTAB_BASE_GROUP + tabId, c4d.BFH_SCALEFIT | c4d.BFV_SCALEFIT, 0, 0) self.AttachSubDialog(tabGui, ID_QUICKTAB_BASE_GROUP + tabId) self.LayoutChanged(ID_MAINGROUP) return True Then in the Command message instead of calling DisplayCorrectGroup you should call _DrawQuickTabGroup like so: def Command(self, id, msg): if id == ID_QUICKTAB_BAR and self._quickTab: self._DrawQuickTabGroup() return True Regarding your question and classic Tab, find an example in Remove a GeDialog Tab Group but as you can see this is also not possible to remove a tab without redrawing everything . Cheers, Maxime.

@Manuel Oh, what a pitty! I know that I can dot it with a effector, but it is not a "all in one" solution for my convenient，but that's it , I will not spend times in it. Thanks for your research, and @HerrMay thanks for your enthusiastic answers ! Cheers~ DunHou

Hi Manuel, Thank you very much. Your script works perfectly in my environment. Only one modification I made was if "color" in portPath: to if "color" in str(portPath): Thank you.

Great, thank you Glad I can help to improve this great program.

Hi @m_adam, thanks for the explanation and your example code. That will absolutely suffice my needs. Good to know though that additional information may be available in the future. Cheers, Sebastian

Hi @m_adam, alrighty, good to know that this will be looked into and eventually get fixed. Yes, I remember I returned True in the past. In the python tag as well as in the TagData equivalent. As returning super didn't work. Thanks for the information anyway. Cheers, Sebastian

Thanks, that was exactly what I was looking for. John Terenece

Hey @ferdinand ,Thanks for your detailed explains forever. Now it is clear to read the res files , and you show me the Agent Ransack last year, I use this software for learn something , and the C++ document is also good for the res file, but some of the data is distribute anywhere , like BITMAPMUTTON , I remember that I search for no fading option for a long time, but in python document it has a user friendly position in sdk. Maybe a document improvement or more Github examples are both welcomed( seems lots of works ) Thanks for your patience！ Cheers~ DunHou

Hi, sorry, the display of this tab is hardcoded an only available for a couple of builtin objects. What you can do is have a Matrix object in object mode that point to your generator, the rs tag being applied to the matrix object. You can also create that setup inside your generator. Below, i am using a cube but that could be your PointObject instead. Keep in mind that python is slow, using it for point cloud or anything related to particles might be super slow. from typing import Optional import c4d doc: c4d.documents.BaseDocument # The document evaluating this python generator op: c4d.BaseObject # The python generator hh: Optional["PyCapsule"] # A HierarchyHelp object, only defined when main is executed def main() -> c4d.BaseObject: . cube = c4d.BaseObject(c4d.Ocube) parent = c4d.BaseObject(c4d.Onull) cube.InsertUnder(parent) matrix = c4d.BaseObject(c4d.Omgmatrix) matrix.InsertUnder(parent) matrix[c4d.ID_MG_MOTIONGENERATOR_MODE] = c4d.ID_MG_MOTIONGENERATOR_MODE_OBJECT matrix[c4d.MG_OBJECT_LINK] = cube matrix[c4d.MG_POLY_MODE_] = c4d.MG_POLY_MODE_VERTEX rsTag = matrix.MakeTag(1036222) rsTag[c4d.REDSHIFT_OBJECT_PARTICLE_MODE] = 2 return parent Cheers, Manuel

Hello @ferdinand, alright I see. I already thought that you would teach me once again that the naive thought I put up here would'nt hold up to the real world. Thanks for the explanation and the example you provided. I guess that will do just fine. As always much appreciated! Cheers, Sebastian

Hello @HerrMay, Funny enough DrawPoints seems to internally use the "same points" to draw, one gets to see when one edits the points of a polygon object. In S26 the points are round (thats probably why I was thinking of circles) while in R20 they are squares. No question here, just an observation. As you can see, in the script I retrieve the cache of the object we are going to draw. # Get the cache of the object representing the plugin in the object manager, i.e., more or # less what we returned in GetContour, Cinema 4D has however exhausted the cache for us, and # the cache is not a SplineObject but a LineObject (i.e, the cache of a SplineObject). cache: c4d.LineObject = op.GetDeformCache() or op.GetCache() if not isinstance(cache, c4d.LineObject): return c4d.DRAWRESULT_O This not only enables us to deal with splines affected by a deformer correctly, but also and more importantly with spline generators as for example the Circle spline generator. Such generators do not have any control points one could retrieve, their cache will always contain LineObject instances and not SplineObject instances (when they have been implemented correctly). This is also what I was referring to in my comment, because OffsetYSpline returns a SplineObject as its cache in GetContour, but Cinema 4D will 'exhaust' that cache for us by returning the cache of the cache, the LineObject. A LineObject represents a SplineObject over its current interpolation settings. What is actually weird though is that the color gradient you used here to color the points doesn't work in R20. The points are simply drawn black there. Possibly a Python 2/3 issue caused by integer/float division differences? Yes, this is Python 3 code. In Python 2 integers divide by default as integers. Simply wrap one of the numbers into a float, e.g., f: float = float(i)/float(count). Allow one follow up question. How can I draw only the control points of the spline? In your example you use a circle primitive which has - when made editable - exactly four points making up the shape via tangents. Where as the drawn points using the intermediate points of the circle as well. You can use BaseObject.GetRealSpline to get the underlying editable spline object for a spline. So, when you would replace the section quoted above with this: cache: c4d.SplineObject = op.GetRealSpline() if not isinstance(cache, c4d.SplineObject): return c4d.DRAWRESULT_OK You would now draw the control points of the SplineObject representing the spline generator rather than the vertices of its underlying LineObject. The problem in this case is that the plugin you have chosen is calling 'Current State to Object' (CSTO) on the input object which it is cloning and returning offset-ed (see line 130 in your code listing). CSTO is of course just replacing an object with its cache state. So, when you put a circle spline below the offset spline, it will still be drawn as in the LineObject cache version because the cache and the BaseObject.GetRealSpline representation are in this case identical. Cheers, Ferdinand

And once again, thank you!

Oh my gosh, so comprehensive answer! I'm so impressed that you put so much effort in it. You a great, thank you a lot!

@ferdinand Thank you, the code runs well. └(^o^)┘

Well, that was a fast solution... couldn't it have emerged BEFORE I hit submit?!? Haha, the solution was easy... I was returning True on the Timer function. Took a look at the python memory viewer example and noticed they don't return a value on it. Removed the return from my Timer() function and all is working as expected. def Timer(self, msg): print("Timer") That's it:)