PASTED_

In maya the copy paste feature can be really useful. The major downside however is that every node that gets pasted gets a nice:

PASTED_ prefix attached to it. Resulting in a horribly messy scene that no one ever cares to clean up… until you have to revisit the scene and have to dive into the world of pasted_ nodes trying to find the correct shader etc.

Now there is a really easy fix for it:

In your maya instalation directory there is a file called cutCopyPaste.mel (of course thanks autodesk … )

in that is a function called pasteScene()

replace that function with the following code:

global proc pasteScene(){

	string $fileExt = ".mb";
	if (`about -ltVersion`) {
		$fileExt = ".mlt";
	}
	else if (`about -evalVersion`) {
		$fileExt = ".mp";
	}

	// determine temp directory
	string $tmpFile = "/maya_sceneClipBoard" + $fileExt;
	string $tmpdir = `getenv TMPDIR`;
	string $filePath = ($tmpdir + $tmpFile);

	// import scene
	string $newTransforms[] = `file -force
		-import
		-renameAll false
		-mergeNamespacesOnClash true
        -namespace ":"
		-groupReference
		-returnNewNodes
		$filePath`;

	select -replace $newTransforms;
	select -replace `ls -sl -head 1`;
}

global proc pasteScene(){

string $fileExt = ".mb";

if (`about -ltVersion`) {

$fileExt = ".mlt";

}

else if (`about -evalVersion`) {

$fileExt = ".mp";

}

// determine temp directory

string $tmpFile = "/maya_sceneClipBoard" + $fileExt;

string $tmpdir = `getenv TMPDIR`;

string $filePath = ($tmpdir + $tmpFile);

// import scene

string $newTransforms[] = `file -force

-import

-renameAll false

-mergeNamespacesOnClash true

-namespace ":"

-groupReference

-returnNewNodes

$filePath`;

select -replace $newTransforms;

select -replace `ls -sl -head 1`;

}

This will merge all the pasted nodes directly into the scene (root namespace ) without adding any prefix or suffix. (Only when the node all ready exists in the same depth it will add a number to the end).

Root Namespace

Whenever I loaded in a referenced scene maya would create a namespace (either with an normal namespace or it would prefix the nodes with the filename and an underscore). However Autodesk has finally been nice enough to open the functionality in the UI to load a scene into the root namespace (making sure the referenced scene does not get any weird naming or namespace. Making it easier to work with)

When going to File > Create reference

The trick is not to disable namespaces on load but enabling them and selecting the : ( root ) namespace and set the following option:

Merge into selected namespace and rename …

Do you also hate adding a

reload(yourModuleName)

1	reload(yourModuleName)

while developing a new tool.
If yes then here is the solution:

if globals().has_key('init_modules'):
    for m in [x for x in sys.modules.keys() if x not in init_modules]:
        del(sys.modules[m])
else:
    init_modules = sys.modules.keys()

if globals().has_key('init_modules'):

for m in [x for x in sys.modules.keys() if x not in init_modules]:

del(sys.modules[m])

else:

init_modules = sys.modules.keys()

This removes all initilised modules from the memory. Even the ones that are loaded using the

import imp
imp.load_source( name , filePath)

1 2	import imp imp.load_source( name , filePath)

method.

This means python will have to reload all modules. So put those few lines at the top of your project and you dont have to worry about reloading your modules while you are developing them. 😀

(Yes i know hacky as hell, but then again thats why we are tech artists :D)

Jan Pijpers: Technical Artist

Tag Archives: hacky

Maya’s “pasted_” is history and maya root namespace.

PASTED_

Root Namespace

Python reload all. Well … kind of