Simplify3D User Forum

Could we please have a Nice isometric angle ICON for the .factory files so that we can see what the file is without having to open it every time?

Thank you !

Oooo that would be nice! Does that actually work on OS X and Windows? I'm guessing you have to save some type of metadata file for the OS to use.

I'm not a CC+ CoCoa programmer on OSX ... but Yes, that is possible.
It does not work ATM w Simplify3D though

well do you have any idea how it actually works? is it possible on windows?

The answer lies in "The Quicklook preview is generated on the fly by a piece of special Quicklook code."

Hah! That's more of a riddle than an answer!

If it is based on quicklook, then it probably doesn't work with Windows or Linux.

I like this idea. Sketchup and several other apps that I use have file-preview icons. Very handy.

tonyno wrote:I like this idea. Sketchup and several other apps that I use have file-preview icons. Very handy.

Well if the Mac OS X is Superior, then let it be so √√

No Mac stuff here.

JoeJ wrote:Oooo that would be nice! Does that actually work on OS X and Windows? I'm guessing you have to save some type of metadata file for the OS to use.

This can be easily done on both OS X and Windows. On Windows it's called "thumbnail" view, on OS X its called icon view.

Both operating systems use different methods for this so Simplify3D would need to have different code for each platform.

On OS X it involves using creating a Quicklook plugin (see http://www.quicklookplugins.com/).

Windows uses a thumbnail handler for this (see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/librar ... s.85).aspx).

Generating these thumbnails/icons can be very time consuming for the CPU and can dramatically slow down file browsing, especially when a folder is browsed for the very first time. Most software that generates these sorts of images will create a cache of generated file images, so that the images are only generated the first time the file is browsed, and then the already generated images re-used for subsequent file browsing. Opening a folder with hundreds of 3D files that need images generated for the first time could take many minutes to complete (this is more of an issue on Windows because it shows more images than the Mac shows).

For something like Simplify3D, it could generate these images only when it saves the factory files, rather than at browse time. That would lesson the impact on file browsing.