Octopus Settings

The Octopus Settings menu contains all the properties that are affecting the entire menu. So not on a /button but a /Octopus Menu basis. This contains Behavioral and Visual settings as well.

Octopus Shift

Octopus Shift is a tool that you can use to append multiple menus under a simple hotkey. Switching between them is easy, just use the mouse wheel.

If you spin up, the TOP, if you spin down the BOTTOM shift will occur. In the above case the Modeling Octopus Menu have two Shifts. The Top one brings up the Selection Octopus menu the bottom will change to the Modifiers menu.

General

The General menu contains simple behaviral settings, like Hold and Release, Hot Zones, Close On Commit and Spinner Click Delay.

Hold and Release

Hold and Release is a RECOMMENDED feature. This makes your modeling much faster and it reduces the number of clicks and button presses. When you turn this on, an Octopus Menu is up and running only as long as you hold the hotkey down. This also related to the Octopus Flash which is also a very powerful feature. (Explained Below)

Hot Zones

Hot Zones are like in Maya. When you use hot zones, you don’t have to bring your mouse over a button, it’s enough just to simply get the cursor into the appropriate section. This actually splits up the space around the buttons and it will trigger that button, which is the closest to the mouse cursor.

Close On Commit

This one is useful when you are NOT using Hold and Release. In that case Comitting an action will close the menu immediately, so you don’t have to click twice. (1. click commit, 2. click close)

This functionality may conflicts with nesting.

Spinner Click Delay

When you hold down the mouse button on a octal menubutton and you have assigned a Single Click and a Spinner Click as well, this is the delay that turns a single click into a spinner. If the click is shorter than the given value (50ms) then it executes the Single Click command. If it’s longer, then it turns the button to a Spinner and will execute that command instead.

Octopus Flash

This functionality is in close relation with Hold and Release. Octopus Flash is basically a repeat last functionality. This means when you have executed a command by comitting it, it will store those values and next time you quickly hit the same hotkey it will execute the exact same command that you have used previously. The Flash Delay controls how long you have to press the hotkey to bring up the menu instead. Below this value it will repeat the last action that has been used.

If you turn on Keep Flash Default, in that case you cannot override the Default Flash functionality. So it looses the Repeat Last Functionality and it will behave like a simple hotkey.

Colors

This section contains all the Color Related controls. Changing these values will change the look of your menus. Scrolling further down the list contains the Octopus Menu Layout and Shape related functions as well as all the animation related properties. These settings do not affect the behaviour of the menus.