Configuration

During the manual I assumed you have the default configuration in place. This of course is to guarantee that you get the same behavior as dictated. But when done reading the manual there's no reason not to change something more to your liking.

The configuration is managed by clicking the button below button in the workspace main toolbar.

This will open the following dialog

Each item in the tree at the left has its own page at the right. You change pages by clicking the items. There are quite a few items, so let's go over them one by one.

Main

Here you set the default author information and application language. The author name, email and website fields will be used for new (suggestion database) packages.

Second panel lets enable/disable online version checking at application start. This feature is completely passive, when there is indeed a newer version available LD4DStudio will only direct your browser to the download page of the site.

Below you find the list of available language files. You can select any of them and if it's a correct file (indicated by status at the right) the apply button will be enabled. Clicking the apply button will change the current language at once.

Main/Workspaces

This page lets you manage your workspaces. If you use more then one screen you can enable a workspace for them. Working with two screens/workspaces opens a whole new experience. One of the best benefits is the ability to put the animation monitor one one while working on sequences at the other. No more desktop swapping for you.

To enable the second screen click on the large '2'. Below the screens layout illustration you'll find a couple of options you can set for each screen. They are:

Create workspace for this screen	Enable/disable workspace creation for chosen screen. This option can't be disabled for the '1' screen.
Keep workspace in place	If enabled the workspace will be kept maximized on its target screen.
Ruler	If enabled this will draw red lines on 'windowed' workspaces at the given absolute 'width' and 'height' locations. You can use this to indicate the boundaries of a lower resolution monitor This is handy when you are organizing e.g. a sample project who will be used by people having a much lower resolution. You can than use the ruler lines to prevent putting windows 'outside' thos lower resolution monitors desktop space.
Wallpaper	At the bottom you'll find a collection of nifty looking patterns which can be used to wallpaper the desktops in windowed mode.

Main/Advanced

You'll find only one option in the advanced section with the current version. It lets you control the number of log files allowed in the logging folder.

Files

On this page you control file related stuff for all LD4DStudio file formats. On this page the only folder you can set is the 'Library base directory'. All library related files will be kept relative to the chosen folder. The chosen directory itself will be kept relative to the installation directory.

Files/Projects

'Default directory' lets you select you're main projects location. It will be used for project open/save dialogs were appropriate. The location is kept relative to the installation directory.

Below the directory selection field are a couple of checkboxes, they are:

Reopen last project on program start.	If you close LD4DStudio it will remember your current project. When you restart the application it will open that project again.
Associate files	If enabled LD4DStudio will register 4pk files in the windows registry. If applied double clicking 4pk files in the explorer will open LD4DStudio with that project.
Make automatic backup	If enabled LD4DStudio will copy the old version of a project file to a ~4pk file before saving the new version. This way you can always revert to the previous saved version if needed.
Ask before saving changed files	If enabled LD4DStudio will ask for confirmation whenever you do something which will close the current project (loading another project, starting a new one). If you disable this option LD4DStudio will presume 'yes' on those confirmations and thus always save your work.
Confirm overwriting of existing file.	If enabled the application will warn you if you attempt to overwrite a existing project file with a new one. If disabled it will be overwritten without question.

Files/Packages

Default library directory lets you select your preferred library package location. It will be used for library package open/save dialogs where appropriate. The location is kept relative to the library base directory.

Below the directory selection field are a couple of check boxes, they are:

Associate files	Same as with the project files but now for the 4pk file extension.
Make automatic backup	Same as with project files, but using the ~4pk extension.
Ask before saving changed files	Same as with project files.
Confirm overwriting of existing file.	Same as with project files.

Files/Suggestion database

Default directory lets you select your preferred suggestion packages location. It will be used for suggestion package open/save dialogs where appropriate. The location is kept relative to the library base directory.

Below the directory selection field are a couple of check boxes, they are:

Associate files	Same as with the project files but now for the 4sp file extension.
Make automatic backup	Same as with project files, but using the ~4sp extension.
Ask before saving changed files	Same as with project files.
Confirm overwriting of existing file.	Same as with project files.

LDraw

The page lets you configure your LDraw environment. First option is the LDraw location selection. This is the folder in which the ldraw.exe file is located. below it are a couple of options you can set, namely:

Verbose logging	If enabled the application will write more information to the log while loading and parsing LDraw files. Enable this only if you experience rendering problems and want to post a bug report. At all other times it's better leave it disabled to speed up loading times.
Monitor file changes	If enabled the application will attempt to detect changes made to LDraw files already loaded. If such a change is detected it will try to reload the file and all its dependencies.
Confirm reload	If file monitoring is enabled and a change is detected a dialog will appear asking if you want to reload. If you disable this check box the application will always reload without asking.

The second panel lets you set an external LDraw editor to use for editing loaded LDraw models. First you select the application main exe and second you need to supply launch parameters. This is the extra text you append to the exe to let the program open a file. It's usually just "%1". %1 will be replaced by the filename of a LDraw model file.

When you start LD4DStudio and there is no editor chosen yet, LD4DStudio will try to use the application currently associated with the '.ldr' file extension. This can also be done from the configuration dialog by clicking the "Detect" button.

The third panel is used (much like the second one) to set a editor for parts in the suggestion database. This can be a different editor because while defining points in the suggestion database you usually more interested in the literal content of a part. So you will most likely be setting this to notepad or something instead of a full blown LDraw editor.

It will default to the program currently associated with the '.dat' file extension. You can reset the default at any time by clicking the 'detect' button.

Last on the page you'll find LDraw cache control. Every time a LDraw file is loaded LD4DStudio calculates a whole bunch of stuff for it to speed up rendering. These preparations cost time while loading. To speed things up there is a caching facility which stores those calculations. When the same part is loaded the next time the loaded can fetch the information from cache instead of recalculating it again.

If the cache is enabled you can rebuild its contents at any time by clicking the 'rebuild' button. This is useful if you just enabled it and there are already some LDraw files in memory.

If the cache is enabled you can also clear it using the 'clear' button. This is useful if you think the file is to large.

If the cache is disabled (not recommended) you can use the 'delete' button to remove the file all together.

LDraw/Materials

LDraw uses 'numbers' to identify what color to apply to a LDraw part. As many of these colors must be defined to guarantee most of your models will render correctly color wise.

The LDraw library contains a 'config' file defining the most common used numbers, but fortunately it's basically upto the LDraw using program to foresee in gathering all needed information.

LD4DStudio does this with it's material management system. It can be configured to read multiple files containing color information in order. This includes the LDraw config file (ldconfig.ldr). It also includes (by default) two LD4DStudio material specific definition files ('offical.xml' and 'povray.xml'). How these files work you can learn about in the technical section of the site. Most users will be ok using the default files though.

What files and the order in which they must be loaded can be configured using this 'materials configuration' page. First you'll see two lists, namely 'Available' and 'used'. The Available list shows 'material' and 'ldraw config' files not jet part of your preferred 'used' list. The 'used' list shows which files are being loaded on application start, they will be loaded in the order they have in this list.

You can add or remove files to from your 'used' list by using the 'add' and 'delete' buttons. Doing so will refresh the two lists. Using the 'up' and 'down' buttons you can move the selected item in the 'used' list around to optimize the preferred order.

Do note colors a later loaded file can overwrite the information loaded from an earlier file in the list. this is mainly why you can control the loading order. It let you set who's boss. Basically it means the lower a file is in the list, the more it will govern the end result.

Second panel on this page is the 'options' panel. It let you control some additional material specific things.

After all files are processed there still can be 'gaps' in the color number list. To fill these gaps with useful information there are two options, namely: 'Calculate missing transparent colors' and 'Calculate missing dither colors'.

'Calculate missing transparent colors' will try to fill the holes left after loading files by automatically calculating the transparent variants of non transparent colors in the range of 32 to 63. 32 will be based up on 0, 33 on 1 and so on. The color will only be set if the base color was set during loading of the files.

'Calculate missing dither colors' does much the same but for dithered colors with index 256 to 511. It will calculate the color by averaging the colors of the two encoded sub colors ranging from 0..15. For example color 486 will be calculated from color 14 '(486-256) div 16' and 6 '(486-256) mod 16'. This will only be done if both sub colors are already defined.

At the right of both options you'll find a 'donor material' editbox. You can use that to assign a base material definition to use for the new material. By default it's 'Transparent blue (33)' and 'Blue (1)' because these colors pretty much always present after load of the files.

Finally you can choose the rendering colors for stuff ending up on screen still having the 'inheritance' index (16 and 24) or an unknown (No material loaded for it) color number.

LDraw/User directories

By default LDraw files are searched at the main parts location and the LDraw library location, but you might want to change that to include some unofficial locations or private LDraw file locations. Thats exactly what you can do with this panel. You can add as many locations as you like to be searched while the program loads.

To add a location use the 'Directory' field to select a folder and use the combobox after it to select the kind of the location. This can be ether "User" or "Library". The user variant is a single non recursive location to look for missing LDraw files. The library variant will thread the location the same as the LDraw base directory. This is extremely handy if you want to add the unofficial part library to your search list. After you have chosen the kind click the 'add' button to append your location at the end of the list. The location will appear with a short keyword in front of it. "USR" indicates an user location and "LIB" indicates a library location.

The official LDraw library location is listed with the 'OFF' keyword and can't be changed in this panel. It is present only to give the complete search order whom you can change by selecting a location and using the 'up' and 'down' buttons. When searching for a part LD4DStudio will look in the locations from top to bottom.

Use 'Delete' to remove the selected location, and use 'Modify' to overwrite the selected location with the current 'directory' settings.

Graphics

This page lets you configure the base colors to be used in 3D windows. It should speak for itself. Secondly, you can select a default location to place screen shots in. This location will be used when a screen shot save dialog is presented. It's relative to the installation folder.

Grid

During the part edit chapter you used the grid to position points. There I told you about the 'smart' grid stepping. Well if you thought it wasn't smart at all, this is the place to adjust it.

You've got two tables to set stepping with, one for the movement grid and one for the rotation grid. Below it you select the preferred default for newly opened windows.

Secondly, there are some options regarding the visual layout of the grids in the 2D view modes. First you choose the movement stepping to use. A line will be drawn in the view port indicating this stepping. finally you select the interval of highlighting to be used for those lines. This can be done for each axis separately.

OpenGL

OpenGL is the language used to communicate with your graphic hardware. This page lets you configure some performance options.

always render from system memory

Modern VGA cards have a decent amount of memory on them (512MB or even more nowadays). This memory is put there because normal system memory is too damn slow. LD4DStudio's rendering engine will try to use as much VGA memory possible to speedup rendering considerably, but nothing is perfect and on some systems this will result in problems (blank screen, corrupt images etc). To this end you can disable the usage of the VGA memory by enabling this option. Use it only if you have problems rendering.

Use double buffering

This option controls using double buffering or not. Double buffering is used to prevent flickering in the render area. This is good, but sometimes it's unnecessary (especially on modern cards). Nothing wrong with that but using unnecessary double buffering slows rendering down. Therefore on most modern cards you can leave this option disabled without developing a headache.

Editors

This page lets you set generic colors to be used in 3D edit windows. "Main grid line" and "Grid line" control the color of lines in the 2D viewmodes. "Background" is used in all viewmodes and "Active view port" is the border color to used to surround the current viewport with.

Editors/Suggestion DB part editor

This page lets you choose defaults for new suggestion db part windows. You can choose defaults for "Render mode", "Sync zoom levels", "Show grid" and "Show only the selected point if one selected".

This page has a subpage called "View", it looks like the picture below:

With this page you can configure your default view port setup. First you choose an orientation (single, double (horizontal or vertical), triple (larger viewport left, right, top or bottom) or quad).

The second panel "Views" lets you choose a "viewkind" and "mouse mode" for each of the available views.

The third panel lets you choose how to 'fill' the available view port orientations with views. Depending on the number of view ports in an orientation you can set up to four views.

Editors/Part editor

This page lets you choose defaults for new part edit windows. You can choose defaults for "Render mode", "Sync zoom levels", "Show grid", "Default part edit mode", "Show only the selected point if one selected" and "Ask for point orientation reset after suggestion accepting". If you disable the last option LD4DStudio will not ask to reset any accepted suggestions. They will be used without resetting.

Just like the Suggestion DB part editor this page has a subpage 'View'. It handles exactly the same so no need to repeat myself.

Editors/Actor editor

This page lets you choose defaults for new actor edit windows. You can choose defaults for "Render mode", "Sync zoom levels", "Show grid", "Show joint selection" and "Show point orientation".

Just like the Suggestion DB part editor this page has a subpage 'View'. It handles exactly the same so no need to repeat myself.

Animation

This page lets you choose the default "Aspect ratio" and "Frame rate" for new animations

Animation/Cameras, lights and variables

This page lets you enable/disable automatic camera and or light creation for new animations. If auto-create is enabled for cameras, a camera of the given type will automatically created for every new animation. The same goes for lights.

In addition you can set the default 'Init to rest values' condition for new camera, light and variable objects.

Animation/Control panels

This page is used to set some options for control panels

First you can enable/disable automatic control panel creation for new animations. If enabled, whenever a new animation is created there will also be a control panel added to it.

Second option lets you control the default control tag color to use for new controls on any control panel.

The last option determines if the sliders and switches in the control panel will be drawn 'disabled' if they can currently not be set by hand. This feature will give the animation engine some extra work to do, which on older computers might be ill spent. So if you think playback is to slow, you might want to disable this feature.

Animation/Monitors

This page controls options for monitor windows. First option controls automatic creation for new animations. Secondly, you can choose the "Background" and "Active view port" colors to use for all monitor windows.

Animation/Monitors/Frame buffer export

This page lets you set the defaults to be used with new exports. All options are the same as explained in the export chapter so I will not repeat myself here.

Animation/Monitors/LDR Export

Like the 'Frame buffer export' page this lets you define default export options , but this time it's for the LDR export. Again most things are explained in the export chapter.

Animation/Monitors/POV-Ray export

The main page of the collection POV-Ray settings only askes for the location of the main POV-Ray exe (pvengine.exe). You can manually locate the file or use the 'detect' button to let LD4DStudio try to find it by examining the default application linked to the '.pov' extension.

Animation/Monitors/POV-Ray export sub pages

The five sub pages of the 'POV-Ray export' page are identical to the tabpages of the POV-Ray export dialog discussed in the export chapter, therefore I'm not going to discuss them again here.

Animation/Sequences

This page controls options for sequence windows. First option controls automatic creation for new animations. Secondly, you can choose the default length (in milliseconds) for, and the default number of channels to add to new sequences.

Animation/Scripting

This panel controls script animation action options. First you can enable/disable the use of the message dialog upon successful script runs. If you disable this, the application will only show a dialog when the run failed.

Second option lets you enable the optional dumping of compiled script commands, this is more a debugging facility. It's usually only enabled when you plan to send a bug report concerning scripting.

The third option is used to set the maximum time any script is allowed to run, this is used to protect against potential infinite loops as discussed in the scripting chapter.

Animation/Scripting/Colors

Here you can control the colors to use in the script text window. Every 'text type' has it's own color you can change using the array of color selection boxes. The results can be inspected in the preview script below.

The 'text types' are:

Background	Background color for all text.
Unknown chars	Invalid characters you might enter, like $ or !.
Comment	Comment
Identifiers	Variable, constant and function names.
Symbols	e.g. '=', '>' and '<='
Keywords	strings like: 'begin', 'end', 'if', 'var'.
Values	Double and boolean constant, e.g. : '1.12', '3243', 'true' and 'false'.

parameters

There are also some options you can force during the start of the program without changing the 'normal' configuration. This is done by using command line parameters. These are phrases you add to the Windows short cut (at the end of the target line) of the program.

You should only use these parameters if you know what you are doing, most of them are for trouble shooting and act as a last resort.

-noJoysticks

The -noJoysticks parameter instructs LD4DStudio to skip the detection of joysticks. Use it only if the application fails to start as a result of errors during joystick detection.

-noTablet

The -noTablet parameter instructs LD4DStudio to skip the detection of your tablet. Use it only if the application fails to start as a result of errors during tablet detection.