Simple HUD Plugin Readme file
rev 0.1alpha 2005-04-14

PLEASE BE CAREFUL, THIS IS PRE ALPHA SOFTWARE AND IS FREE, I CANNOT ENSURE YOU IT DOESN'T CRASH AND DESTROY
YOUR PRECIOUS WORK SO SAVE OFTEN AND USE THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK...

Hello,
this is a very simple support file to help you use SimpleHUD my very first plugin for SILO, the coolest modeler :)

SimpleHUD lets you put some text pages around the SILO working viewport (currently it is replicated in all viewports, sorry);
these pages can be configured by you with fixed text and "dynamic" content (i.e. Current time).
Current dynamic content is very simple and is a porting from my last test, in the future I hope to add some more
data if anyone is interested.

Installation:
Put SimpleHUD.dll and SimpleHUD.ini in your \Plugins\Startup Plugins dir under SILO installation path.

Usage:
The plugin has 5 functions:
1- ALWAYS ACTIVE (main rendering infos function) can't see in Customization Dialog (where you assign keys)
2- "Simple HUD Switch" - Assign to key to enable/disable rendering
3- "Simple HUD Next Page" - Assign to key to move to next page (works only if rendering is enabled)
4- "Simple HUD Prev Page" - Assign to key to move to prev page (works only if rendering is enabled)
5- "Simple HUD Reload INI" - Assign to key to reload and reparse INI file

INI file structure:
The Simple HUD configuration file is very simple, it's using the usual window style:
[title]
item=value

you can have many items for each title.

INI is divided in two parts, global config data ( under title [CONFIG]) and dynamic pages ([SECTIONn] titles).

CONFIG data are used to define some common attributes:

HUD_POS_X
	(default 450) - Left position for each row of data in a page
	
HUD_POS_Y
	(default 65) - Starting top position
	
HUD_STEP_Y
	(default 15) - Next row is calculated subtracting this value from previous y row pos
	
FONT_SIZE
	(default 18) - Font size
	
FONT_FACE
	(default Arial) - Font face (be carefult not to crash the plugin using invalid font names)

COLOR_RED
COLOR_GREEN
COLOR_BLUE
	(default 64) - Color attributes per channel (from 0 to 255) used while drawing text

DISPLAY_ONSTART
	(default 0) - Show first page on startup 1 or don't show it 0

NOTE:
The screen is virtually considered as a 640 x 480 viewport with origin bottom left, so, when
placing your infos consider the left is low values for HUD_POS_X and moving right means approaching 640.0
(well less because this is the row starting position).
Text is written starting from HUD_POS_Y then going down subtracting HUD_STEP_Y for each row in a page.


Pages are defined by SECTIONn sections where n goes from 1 to 5. If you skip a number you get only the page from
1 to last sequential available number.
You can define 5 pages at max.

For each section you can have 28 rows of text, each row is defined by ROWDATAi where i goest from 1 to 28 at max.
Here again you should no skip rows or parsing stops.

example - 2 page configuration :
[SECTION1]
ROWDATA1=This is the only row in page one

[SECTION2]
ROWDATA1=This page has 2 rows. This one
ROWDATA2=and this one...cool

The "power" (ok just joking) of Simple HUD comes from tags that you can insert into ROWDATA items (use them with * chars):
*CUR_DATE*
	Current date - yyyy-mm-dd format
*CUR_TIME*
	Current time - hh:mm:ss format
*ELAPSED*
	Elapsed time from SILO start - hh:mm:ss format
*CAMERA_NAME*
	Current camera name
*SEL_FACES*
	Number of selected Faces
*SEL_EDGES*
	Number of selected Edges
*SEL_VERTICES*
	Number of selected Vertices

example - row with some info:

[SECTION1]
ROWDATA1=You have *SEL_VERTICES* selected. Be careful


NOTE:
to have empty rowss use BLANK i.e. ROWDATA6=BLANK


Well, hope it helps, see included sample INI file.

AGAIN...PLEASE BE CAREFUL, THIS IS PRE ALPHA SOFTWARE AND IS FREE, I CANNOT ENSURE YOU IT DOESN'T CRASH AND DESTROY
YOUR PRECIOUS WORK SO SAVE OFTEN AND USE THIS AT YOUR OWN RISK...

May you all be happy and leave in peace with the one you love and never lose passion for anything you do
	BlackLizard
