Survival Guide

If Seamless Wont Open any More

If seamless wont open anymore but use to, go to the folder:

My Documents\Seamless3d\Application Data For Seamless3d

and delete the seamless3dSetup.wrl file. If this fails try renaming or deleting the file named untitled.smls. This should force seamless to create a brand new smls file.

Letting the Software Robot Guide You

To see if seamless works on your system try the first 2 demos out by moving the mouse to the F10 menu and selecting:

help->beeline to animation demo

help->build avatar demo

The robot demos have significantly improved seamless's reliability but there are still more demos to be written to test yet more of it's features out and there is always going to be novel combinations that may result in a crash or un documented behavior.

Some of the demos require first that the contents of the files_for_demos.zip file be manually unzipped and put in the folder:

My Documents\Seamless3d\Application Data For Seamless3d\For Robot Demos Only

It is possible that a file may seem ok while you are working with it and then later find the file wont open because it's integrity has been corrupted. This is why it pays to play it safe by regularly making backups each day.

Crashes and Undo/Redo

You can Undo and Redo using the buttons from the tool bar but do not rely on this without backing up your work manually because nothing is 100% reliable especially in a cutting edge program like seamless3d. If Seamless crashes unexpectedly you can usually retrieve your work. Go to the folder:

My Documents\Seamless3d\Application Data For Seamless3d\undoCache

In here there will be all the smls files that get backed up after each command.

The incremental numbers for the filenames and the date of the file can help to figure which file was what.

Files from a crash do not get automatically deleted so you will want to delete the files every so often to free up space. Also for reasons I have not yet established, the undo feature does not always work corectly when old files from a crash are left undeleted.

Scaling Parts

Unless you know what you are doing, try to avoid using a Part's node scale field to scale any of the part nodes because for some reason related to Direct X (that i have yet to fix) the parts color and shading will be displayed horribly wrong if this is done. Scaling a part can be done without leaving side effects if you compile the scale field. This is done by selecting the part and then selecting compileTransform/scale from the main menu. This function will restore the scale field back to 1 1 1 (not-scaled) but the part's geometry and the geometry for any descendant parts will remain the same size when it was scaled.

Asking Questions on the Forum

Help is always on hand at the forum. Seamless3d specific questions are much valued but please use the forum rather than posting emails directly to me if possible because questions on the forum help to keep the forum alive and so your questions will in turn help this free open software flourish. Please don't feel concerned about asking silly questions, the forum is there to help. If there is any point in a tutorial where you are unsure or would like to understand something better, ask away.

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