Tools that help when working with SchMEe

[tirpider]

My hopes are that it will one day be a standalone msh editing tool that can generate and visualize a msh without any other tool.  It isn't there yet. Not by a longshot.

So here are tools I use to help with the various hacks I do with it and a brief description of how it can be used along side SchMEe.

None of this is carved in stone. If you have a tool that works out better for you (because of personal preference, OS compatibility, ect) post it's name and a link to the program's homepage and I'll add it to the list.



A Text Editor
In general, a text editor will help you manage batch files. Any will do, I use an old one called AEdix, by Kirys Tech 2000. It's no longer supported by the developer though.  Notepad is fine for handling txt files though, really.



A Hex Editor
Currently, SchMEe is a hex-editing assistant. So you will still need a Hex Editor to do minor things, like making changes to chunk files when compiling exploded msh's.

I use XVI32, by Christian Maas, because it's simple to use and easy to set up (and it's free.)
Homepage: http://www.chmaas.handshake.de/delphi/freeware/xvi32/xvi32.htm



A Model Viewer
There is the remote possibility that SchMEe may get this feature one day. Till then you need a way to see what you are editing. There are a limited number of programs for this and all have limitations.

Star Wars Battlefront Viewer, by Tim Skillman.
It doesn't render cloth or special material effects. It can convert from MSH to WRL and WRL to MSH for migrating models to and from SWBF, though. All bones and nulls are lost in the conversions, so use it for converting non-animated models only.
Author's homepage: http://sites.google.com/site/swbfmodding/Home
SWBFGamers download: http://www.swbfgamers.com/index.php?action=downloads;sa=view;down=324

3D Object Converter (shareware, but functional as a model viewer)
Loads a ton of formats. The paid version can save tons of formats. I use it as a viewer and also to identify clusters or segments via it's object browser function.
It can display models as a wireframe or with flat or smooth shading.
It can also save a bmp of the UV's of a single cluster. (these can be combined in a image editor, such as gimp or paint.net to make a proper UV stamp as a skinner's aid.)
But, it does not read bones, and it does read hidden geometry and ignores the hidden flag (useful for previewing shadows.) So that can be seen as a bug with benefits.
It reads triangles from the NDXL instead of the STRP. So it cant open all MSH files. This is fixable by passing the MSH through SchMEe and using the "Rebuild Triangle Lists" option.  It doesn't hurt the MSH and it allows you to use this great viewer.
Homepage: http://3dconverter.clanteam.com/

I'll mention the XSI ModToool and ZETools, because they will import a MSH and you can then view it, but if you are working with XSI, then you probably have little use for a hack tool like SchMEe and the ModTool is a bit cumbersome to be used as just a viewer.



A MSH DATA Viewer
Something to see what the hard numbers are without having to ctrl+f through the MSH in a hex editor.

SWBF_MSH_INFO
Another tool I wrote (in AutoIT, of course) that does exactly that. It provides a hierarchal view of every tag in the MSH and in most cases, a translation of all the various data types.
SchMEe actually uses some code from this, but it's old, and many changes had to be made to make it safe to save MSH files.
SWBF_MSH_INFO never saved correctly.
It has some functions for copying data to the clipboard, and that's about it. It's a data viewer only.
But if all you want to know is how many SEGM's use a certain material, or what the tga names for the msh are, then running this and navigating the tag tree is a lot quicker then fussing around in a hex-editor.
I believe I started a thread on it, and will update this when I find it.
The version I use daily is on my dropbox: SWBF_MSH_INFO.rar
32bit only atm. If you want source, I'll pull it off my old drive, but it's old. Use SchMEe's source to study. It's better in every way.

(edit: minor editing -tirpider)