Navisworks 2012 - Object/Orbit tool reversed from Walk tool

[creyc]

I use a Space Navigator for getting around building models in Navisworks 2012 and there's one outstanding issue I have with it: reversing the axis' from the walk tool to the object tool, and I jump between these tools all day.

By default, using the Space Navigator in Navisworks 2012 the walk tool functions as expected, I.e. pushing forwards drives "into" the scene, rotating the cap back looks up in the scene, etc.

Switching to the Object/Orbit tool reverses all these axis, pushing forwards pushes the object away, rotating back orbits down in the scene, etc. It makes sense in theory, imitating you're actually holding the model in your hand and rotating it same as you move the cap. Unfortunately it's very unintuative in practice and I'd like to reverse this to my liking, without reversing the motion of the walk tool.

Since both tools use the same Navisworks profile, simply reversing the axis' in 3DxWare fixes one tool but breaks the other. I played with profile swapping a little and it seems like it might do what I'm after, but with only two buttons on this Navigator, it seems like profile swapping would take up both. Is there any better way to do what I'm looking for?

Maybe a normal-reverse toggle needing only one button somehow? And somewhat related, could I program a button to tell Navisworks to switch between 3DConnexion Walk and 3DConnexion Object tools?

[jwick]

I use a Space Navigator for getting around building models in Navisworks 2012 and there's one outstanding issue I have with it: reversing the axis' from the walk tool to the object tool, and I jump between these tools all day.

By default, using the Space Navigator in Navisworks 2012 the walk tool functions as expected, I.e. pushing forwards drives "into" the scene, rotating the cap back looks up in the scene, etc.

Switching to the Object/Orbit tool reverses all these axis, pushing forwards pushes the object away, rotating back orbits down in the scene, etc. It makes sense in theory, imitating you're actually holding the model in your hand and rotating it same as you move the cap. Unfortunately it's very unintuative in practice and I'd like to reverse this to my liking, without reversing the motion of the walk tool.

This is by design. In object mode you are holding an object. In camera mode you are holding a camera. It is more than just reversing the axes; the rotation point moves also from the object in your hand to your camera position. It doesn't take too much effort to make the jump, but I suppose it is like going from a Mac to a PC scroll direction for a while.

Since both tools use the same Navisworks profile, simply reversing the axis' in 3DxWare fixes one tool but breaks the other. I played with profile swapping a little and it seems like it might do what I'm after, but with only two buttons on this Navigator, it seems like profile swapping would take up both. Is there any better way to do what I'm looking for?

You could program a single button to call a batch file that knows which file you just copied and can copy the other one (over the %appdata%/.../Navisworks.xml file). This definitely is an advantage of the devices with more buttons.

Maybe a normal-reverse toggle needing only one button somehow? And somewhat related, could I program a button to tell Navisworks to switch between 3DConnexion Walk and 3DConnexion Object tools?

I don't know if Autodesk implemented keyboard shortcuts for those items. It wouldn't surprise me if they were exposed through a COM interface that you could access via VBScript if nothing else. You'd have to ask on their forum. They did all the camera/object control code.

Other than that, how does it work in Navisworks? Is it useful?