Author: Unknown
Editing: Eep²
RWXMod browses and modifies RWX-format models. RWXMod lets you select and view the model from various angles before using it to build in Active Worlds. RWXMod is a superset of RWXLook, which used to be included with Active Worlds.
RWXMod will not work at the same time as Active Worlds under Windows 3.1. You must use Windows 9x/NT to run both programs concurrently.
File | Edit | View | Utilities | Options
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Consolidate clumps: Consolidates (groups) all sub/nested clumps within a model. It is necessary to consolidate clumps in order to enable centering and scaling, and to eliminate duplicate vertices (see "Clean vertices" below). Do not use on articulated avatars or heirarchial/nested clumping will be lost!
Clean Vertices: Eliminates very close together vertices with duplicate UV values and coordinates which will make the model load faster.
Triangles->quads: Primitively matches up adjacent triangles and unites them into quads if possible, attempting to cut the polygon count. This is important for frame rate and collision detection. Some RWX files created with tools such as 3D Studio and converted to RWX can be cut by close to half their initial polygon count this way. Note: AW3 will triangulate all objects anyway so using this option is unnecessary.
Orient: Displays "Orient Model" dialog, from which you can choose to either center the model in the x, y, and z axes, and/or make them flush with the ground. All building models should be flush with the ground for ease of use, unless the object is special/unique (specific rotation design, etc). All models, including avatars, should be centered in the x and z axes for visibility and encroachment calculations. Do not use the "Flush with Ground" orient option with humanoid avatar models or their point-of-view will be changed to the ground instead of the head (eye-level).
Scale: Displays the "Scale Object" dialog box, which allows you to view and change the current size of the model. Choose the "Keep Aspect Ratio" option to scale the model evenly on its x, y, and z axes, or deselect it to change the planes individually. The view menu changes the way an object looks, without saving your changes. The view commands include:
Wireframe: Displays where the polygons are in the object. (Mostly useful when creating new models.)
Top View/Side View: Changes the camera angle between top and side angles.
Reset: Sets the camera and the previewed object to a default position, restores stripped textures, and turns off wireframe mode.
Info: Displays "Selected Model Properties" window listing information such as dimensions, polygon, and vertex count.
Rendering Speed: Provides an approximate index of how the model renders. Higher numbers indicate slower rendering speed. This is relative to configuration and will vary by machine. Set environment preferences; all options saved between sessions in the RWXMOD.INI file:
Models Path: Lists the directory(ies) where RWXMod first looks for models when you select Open File. as with the texture path, additional path(s) can be added. Use "." for same directory as the file.
Horizontal Rotate and Vertical Rotate: Enables/disables use of the mouse to drag a model around x and z axes. See Moving a Preview Model.
Show Bounding Box: Enables/disables the yellow wireframe bounding box around each model.
Show Ground: Displays a ground object along with the selected object for reference.
Start in FileOpen mode: Enables/disables the File|Open window when RWXMod starts.
Moving A Preview Model
While viewing a model, you may move it around to see it better.
Menu Command Reference
File
Open...
Browse models and optionally select one to view in a larger window. Once Open is selected, RWXMod presents a modified Windows open-file window which includes a small preview window where the selected model is shown. While browsing models pressing the "Spin" button causes the previewed model to automatically spin slowly around the y-axis. The spin setting is saved in RWXMOD.INI and applied the next time RWXMod loads. Other commands are available from the pull-down menus in this browse window, as well as in the main RWXMod window, and are described in more detail below.
Saves the model in RWX format. This does a second pass to remove white (blank) space and unneeded precision (decimal digits) from colors and vertex coordinates. This results in a file which should load and render faster than files converted from high-end modelling tools. However, RWXMod does not fully optimize the RWX code for fast loading so, if you want, learn how to format it better. Also, RWXMod will not save (and actually remove) commented lines so make a backup of the original RWX (or save as a different file name) if you want to edit/revert/refer to it later.
Quits RWXMod.
Edit
From the Edit menu you can change objects, or undo changes in some cases. Changes made save to disk only if you save an RWX file explicitly, using the "Save As" command on the "File" menu. Edit commands include:
Undo: Resets (undoes) model to a state before the last command issued.
View
Strip textures: Displays the object with textures turned off.
Utilities
Generate Registry File: Displays a Generate Registry File window in which you enter the output file path, the input directory path (a file path and name or wildcard mask, such as "*.RWX"), and a comma-separated list of model names to exclude. REGISTRY.TXT is a file used by Active Worlds world servers to calculate encroachment between objects.
Options
Settings
Textures Path: Lists the directory(ies) RWXMod will look for textures when loading objects. Additional path(s), seprated by semicolons (;) can be added. RWXMod automatically looks for textures in a directory called "textures". For instance, if you are browsing C:\Program Files\Active Worlds\Cache\objects.activeworlds.com\Models, RWXMod looks in C:\Program Files\Active Worlds\Cache\objects.activeworlds.com\Textures and along the path you specify here. Textures must be in BMP format. Use "." for same directory as the RWX. Subdirectories won't be automatically searched like for the models path.