Nodes Interface Guideline: inline sockets, socket and option ordering and panels #112092

New Issue

Dalai Felinto · 2023-09-07T18:30:13+02:00

Dalai Felinto commented

2023-09-07 18:30:13 +02:00

Design

With the new features coming to Blender 4.0 is important to establish a set of rules to be used by builtin-nodes and node groups alike. These rules should be enforced on the API level as much as possible.

The order proposed is:

Inlined sockets
Outputs
Options
Inputs
Panels

Within panels the same order would be respected (inline, inputs and outputs).

Note that long-term the idea is to turn Options into inputs. Having them placed before the Inputs make sure this transition can happen smoothly.

Inline socket

Example of inlined nodes:

For compositor a lot of the nodes can inline their Image input/output sockets:

The Geometry Nodes that process geometry in/out often have a Geometry socket that can be inlined:

For shaders this will be used less often. But it is still possible to find some cases there:

Inline and muting

To help decide when something should be inlined, you can try to think whether you would like this to be a passthrough when muting.
That said, not all passthrough muting should be inline.

Take the Mix Shader node for example:

When muted the first "Shader" is passthroughed:

That doesn't mean we need to make it inlined. It does mean the second socket should never be inlined with the output though.

Additionally we can (should) support multiple inline sockets to be respectively passthroughed upon muting.

# Design With the new features coming to Blender 4.0 is important to establish a set of rules to be used by builtin-nodes and node groups alike. These rules should be enforced on the API level as much as possible. The order proposed is: * Inlined sockets * Outputs * Options * Inputs * Panels Within panels the same order would be respected (inline, inputs and outputs). Note that long-term the idea is to turn Options into inputs. Having them placed before the Inputs make sure this transition can happen smoothly. # Inline socket Example of inlined nodes: For compositor a lot of the nodes can inline their Image input/output sockets: ![image](/attachments/b567ab40-de10-4c15-8b7b-11059af12a44) The Geometry Nodes that process geometry in/out often have a Geometry socket that can be inlined: ![image](/attachments/696df2a3-65cf-4084-bd7b-a5f5ab97bb04) For shaders this will be used less often. But it is still possible to find some cases there: ![image](/attachments/d6291fdd-0f9c-4ff5-b17e-7a3f96112e54) # Inline and muting To help decide when something should be inlined, you can try to think whether you would like this to be a passthrough when muting. That said, not all passthrough muting should be inline. Take the Mix Shader node for example: ![image](/attachments/4e20f839-0d73-4f6e-b605-8a120e8aa626) When muted the first "Shader" is passthroughed: ![image](/attachments/e2face44-9562-4604-8e3d-7afa47459077) That doesn't mean we need to make it inlined. It does mean the second socket should *never* be inlined with the output though. Additionally we can (should) support multiple inline sockets to be respectively passthroughed upon muting.

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Dalai Felinto added the

Type

Design

label 2023-09-07 18:30:13 +02:00

Dalai Felinto added this to the Nodes & Physics project 2023-09-07 18:30:15 +02:00

Dalai Felinto changed title from ~~WIP: Nodes Interface Guideline: inline sockets, socket and option ordering and panels~~ to Nodes Interface Guideline: inline sockets, socket and option ordering and panels

2023-09-07 18:41:33 +02:00

Dalai Felinto commented

2023-09-07 18:43:56 +02:00

Plan of action:

Support panels for built-in nodes.
Support inlined sockets (for built-in nodes and node-groups).
Try it out to see if this will look good in real node-trees.

If we are happy with the result:

Add inlined (and panels) for built-in nodes.
Implement the restrictions so users cannot order sockets violating these rules (with warnings explaning what is happening)

Plan of action: * Support panels for built-in nodes. * Support inlined sockets (for built-in nodes and node-groups). * Try it out to see if this will look good in real node-trees. If we are happy with the result: * Add inlined (and panels) for built-in nodes. * Implement the restrictions so users cannot order sockets violating these rules (with warnings explaning what is happening)

Nika Kutsniashvili commented

2023-09-08 12:26:13 +02:00

Inlined sockets on mix shader makes it seem like it passes out first shader only. I think it's unintuitive to use that for nodes that are combining two or more inputs, instead of modifying one

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Nodes Interface Guideline: inline sockets, socket and option ordering and panels #112092

Design

Inline socket

Inline and muting