As a molecular modeler, managing animation nodes efficiently can make a significant difference in your workflow. Whether you’re building a dynamic visualization or toggling visibility during simulations, understanding animation attributes in SAMSON’s Node Specification Language (NSL) can be incredibly useful. This blog post highlights how to harness these attributes effectively to save time and streamline your tasks.
The animation attributes are part of an attribute space specific to animation nodes in SAMSON. The short name for this attribute space is an, making it easy to incorporate into your queries and expressions.
What Animation Attributes Can You Use?
Here’s a quick glance at the animation attributes along with their short names, possible values, and examples to help you get started:
| Attribute name | Short name | Possible values | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
| hidden | h |
true, false |
an.h, not an.h |
| name | n |
Strings in quotes | an.n "A", an.n "L*" |
| selected | — | true, false |
an.selected, not an.selected |
| selectionFlag | sf |
true, false |
an.sf false, an.sf |
| visibilityFlag | vf |
true, false |
an.vf false, an.vf |
| visible | v |
true, false |
an.v, not an.v |
For example, you can toggle the visibility of an animation node with an.v false, or use an.n "A" to target nodes with a specific name. The flexibility of these attributes lets you build powerful queries quickly.
Inherited Attributes
Some animation attributes are inherited from generic node attributes. Here are some key examples:
- hidden: Control whether a node is hidden using
an.h. - name: Match nodes by name, for instance,
an.n "MyAnimation". - selectionFlag: Used to denote selection states (
trueorfalse). - visibilityFlag: Flag nodes for visibility preferences (
an.vf).
Why Should You Use Animation Attributes?
If you’ve ever found yourself struggling to control or interact with multiple animation nodes, mastering these attributes is a game-changer. For instance, toggling visibility for several nodes is as simple as applying a single logical expression. This precision and efficiency is especially beneficial when working on complex simulations or animations where only certain nodes need updates.
Would you like to explore all these attributes and how they can enhance your productivity? Check out the detailed documentation at https://documentation.samson-connect.net/users/latest/nsl/animation/.
SAMSON and all SAMSON Extensions are free for non-commercial use. Learn more and download SAMSON at https://www.samson-connect.net.