How To Select Object By Name/type

[yunjun]

hi, a quick question:

I remember seeing it somewhere but can't find it anymore. How to select/get a handle of an object in the scene by its name or type ? suppose I have an MString (name) and I also know the type (curveVarGroup).

a relative question: how to attach an object to an MFnDagNode if I only know its name(MString)?

Thanks.

[daniel-faust]

Yeah it was something like MSelectionList::select("name")

2nd part extract the MObject from the item in he selectionlist and pass it into the MFnDagNode. (Must be a dag node, retrieve it from the selectionlist wiht dagpath I guess, i think it fails if you use getDependNone() to get a dagnode so use getdagpath and use that to feed the mfndagnode) but check if it works with the getdependnode, cause if it works it'll save you a bit of cpu time

[yunjun]

Thanks, Daniel_Faust,
I looked into the MSelectionList and my major problem with it is that I already have some objects in the active list in use so I don't want to alter the list. I want to get a handle to another object (newly created curve from intersection of 2 surfaces) without touching the active selection list. Is there any other way?

[daniel-faust]

oh you dont have to use the active selection list. you can have as many selection lists as you wish, and none of them have to be active.

MSelectionList mslActive = MSelectionList::getActiveSelectionList();
MSelectionList::setActiveSelectionList(mslActive);

MSelectionList mslSomeNode; <-- this selection list is empty
mslSomeNode.select("name"); <-- this does not alter the active selection list;
mslSomeNode.getDagPath(0, dagPath); <-- now dagpath is the path to the dag node
mslSomeNode.getDepNode(0, moObject); <-- now moObject is the MObject for the dependency node

MSelectionList::setActiveSelectionList(mslSomeNode); <-- NOW we have changed the objects which are selected in the viewport, but of course you don't have to do that if you don't want to

[yunjun]

Thanks, I will try what you suggested and hopefully it will work!

[daniel-faust]

Just noticed that there is no select member. Just for the record, it's the add member which inserts an object into an instance of the MSelectionList class.