ZBrushCentral

VisualZ - Preview of a Zscript Compiler

MTB made a wish for a WYSIWYG Zscript Editor on another thread and I thought it might be appropriate to give you guys a little preview of what I have been working on for the last couple of months.

With VisualZ you can layout your user interface right on the screen. It allows you to organize your subroutines and interface code with the help of various Wizards, save them to Libraries to use with other projects. Insert Zscript commands right into your code with a click of a mouse and then tailor the parameters to your needs. There is a Wizard that will help you create NoteIbutton Interfaces much like the main program and a Button Wizard to create and label your interface buttons. When you are ready to test or publish your Zscript you compile it, this creates a Zscript file that provides all the correct alignments to create an interface exactly how you defined on the screen. It will also determine all the various dependencies your script has, such as graphics, data files, etc. and save them all to a folder that you can zip up and release for public consumption. Hopefully it will become an essential tool for all you zscripters out there and entice alot of you others to give it a whirl, it is alot of fun! The Zscript language is actually a pretty powerful language and it is getting better with each release. Hopefully I can finish this up and get it documented by the time the next Zbrush version is out.

Attachments

VisualZWindow.JPG

“Ask and Ye shall receive…”, MTB must be psychic.

This is a monster GREAT idea Digits! Question: have you actually used this already on some of your released scripts?

Between you and Pixolator we’ll all be salivating for the next few months from anticipation. :smiley:

Sven

This very cool Digits!! Wow!

Can I ask what you are coding it in?

I’ll wait behind Sven in the anticipation department…lots of awesome stuff coming our way it looks like!! I kinda feel like a kid at christmas!!

Monster Digit !!!
I was hoping you share this…

Thanks.

cameyo

p.s. i have some program to develop scripts…but your IDE will be a MUST.

Wow, to say this looks impressive is an understatement. Now there are two things I can hardly bear waiting for…

Thanks a lot for this sure helpful tool¡
Andreseloy

Thanks for your interest guys

have you actually used this already on some of your released scripts?

If you look at the included source code for my Light Widget you will notice a few of the automatically generated comments. It is currently written in Visual Basic 5 but I hope to port it over to Visual Net soon. In fact Visual Basic as a RAD compiler gave me the idea.

Another timesaving feature the program has is that you can save the Zscript Window Screen, import it into Photoshop. You can then create the background in photoshop or create a Alpha image to use in Zbrush to create drop shadows etc… You can re-arrange your controls on your interface so quickly that adding functionality or fine tuning your zscript is never a chore. You can rapidly incorporate these changes without spending hours re-calculating spacing and alignment. Same goes for the NoteIbutton wizard.

I have found that when writing Zscripts you really have to make sure you declare every variable. It may seem that your code works but it is often the major cause of flaking and buggy behavior. With VisualZ every time you create a new variable to use in your code, just right-click and select “Make/Check Define”. If the selected Variable name does not exist it will prompt you for an initial value and automatically create a VarDef for it in your code. If it already exists it will tell you in which Declaration block that it resides.

…we name “Yes another Zscript Editor” so YAZE :smiley:
Pilou

Digits: After you get “VisualZ” complete are you going to call the next version “VisualZ++” ? :smiley:

Side note for non-programmers: “++” is code for incrementing by 1.
-TL74

This is looking very tasty Digits :eek: Seems like you have tons of features in there, which is good.

I was dabbling with a Note Window Interface designer through zscripting but your program looks to easily outclass it. Can’t wait to try it out.