AdamCodd/unreal-engine-5-raw · Datasets at Hugging Face

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As an alternative, you can use Blocking Volumes to add invisible box-shaped collision volumes into the Level. This is a simple way to get collisions working in your Level without the need to modify your Static Meshes. However, since these volumes aren't attached to your Static Meshes, you may need to move them by hand if you move the geometry in your Level around.

Click image to expand.

When a new person joins the session, they start at the position of a randomly selected Player Start Actor. You should have at least one Player Start Actor in your Level, wherever it makes sense for new people to begin. You'll probably want to place the Actors just above a walkable surface, so that if a player switches to Walk mode they won't fall through the surface.

It's a good idea to add a few of these Actors around the same location, so that new people are less likely to overlap the exact location of other players when they join the session.

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

If you've followed all the steps above, you should be able to get multiple users connected to a single design review session, with everyone seeing the custom content you added to the Level.

You can influence the behavior of the Transform and Xray interactions at runtime by the way you set up your content.

The Mobility setting of each Actor determines whether or not you can use the Transform interaction to move that object at runtime. If you want to be able to move the object at runtime, set its Mobility to Movable. If you want to be able to highlight and select the object, but not to be able to move it around in space, set its Mobility to Static.

The hierarchy of parent and child Actors that you see in the Outliner affects both the Transform and Xray interactions.

When you use the Transform interaction to move an object at runtime, all of that object's children move along with the parent automatically, maintaining their current offset from the parent.

For example, in this case all the parts of the transmission are parented to Building_Parent: the large flat foundation Actor.

Click image to expand.

Therefore, at runtime, moving the foundation Actor also moves its child Actors. However, you can still move each child Actor on its own. The next time you move the parent, the children keep their new offsets.

Resetting a child Actor to its original position resets it to its original offset from the parent Actor, not its original position and rotation in world space. Resetting a parent Actor to its original position moves all of its children so that they keep their current offset from the parent.

When you use the Xray Isolate interaction mode, and you select an object in the scene, all other objects that are in the same hierarchy as the selected object are automatically hidden.

For example, in the case of the default scene content, all the objects that make up the main building are under a single top-level parent in the hierarchy. Therefore, when you use Xray Isolate to select any part of the building, all other parts of the building are hidden—that is, all Actors that are parented under the same top-level Building_Parent item.

Click image to expand.

The trees and exterior terrain are unaffected, because they are not under the Building_Parent hierarchy.

The Simulate Physics setting must be off for any Actor that you want to be able to interact with using either the Xray or Transform command. You'll find this in the Details panel under the Physics section.

Click image to expand.

The main menu of the Collab Viewer Template is set up to load the CollaborativeViewer_P Level when users complete the main menu. However, you may want to create a new Level to hold your content, and have the main menu start your own Level instead. If you choose to do this, you'll need to change the logic in the main menu so that it opens your Level when the user joins the session.

To set the starting Level for the Collab Viewer:

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

Click image to expand.

The next time you start your Project and complete the main menu, you will start inside the custom Level that you set up in the procedure above.

This feature is considered experimental. Currently, it will only function for the single player application, and will be disabled on multiplayer.

You can now load a Datasmith file at runtime. At the moment, it is limited to the .udatasmith file format.

Datasmith runtime loading from the main menu.

Using Your Own 3D Models

Controlling Transform and XRay Behavior

Changing the Starting Level

Loading Datasmith Files at Runtime

Steps

End Result

Steps

End Result

Remarks

The pop-up window to select a file to import in the Collab Viewer.

Actor Relevancy

Unreal Engine levels can be very large. At any time, a player might only see a small fraction of the total number of actors in a level. Most of the actors are not visible or audible, nor do they have a significant effect on the current player. The set of actors the server determines are capable of affecting a client in any significant way are considered relevant for this client. The set of relevant actors is determined on a per-client, or, in networking terms, a per-connection basis. Unreal Engine only replicates actors to a client if they are relevant for that client.

The following image comparison showcase a contrived example that uses distance-based relevancy. The primary actor (in the middle of the frame) is set to have replicated actors remain relevant if they are within 300 centimeters (3 meters). In the before image, the secondary actor is within 300 cm, and is relevant. This means that the secondary actor is replicated to the primary actor’s connection and is visible. In the after image, the secondary actor has traveled beyond 300 cm from the primary actor; therefore, the actor is no longer relevant to the primary actor, is not replicated to the primary actor’s connection, and is not visible.

Dynamically spawned, replicated actors are destroyed on the client when they are no longer relevant. This is why the secondary actor is no longer visible to the primary actor in this case.

The network driver determines whether an actor is relevant for a particular connection with a call to AActor::IsNetRelevantFor. This is handled automatically by the network driver.

You can force any actor to be relevant by calling AActor::ForceNetRelevant in your AActor-derived class.

You can customize actor relevancy by overriding the virtual function AActor::IsNetRelevantFor in your AActor-derived class.

As an alternative, you can use Blocking Volumes to add invisible box-shaped collision volumes into the Level. This is a simple way to get collisions working in your Level without the need to modify your Static Meshes. However, since these volumes aren't attached to your Static Meshes, you may need to move them by hand if you move the geometry in your Level around.

Click image to expand.

When a new person joins the session, they start at the position of a randomly selected Player Start Actor. You should have at least one Player Start Actor in your Level, wherever it makes sense for new people to begin. You'll probably want to place the Actors just above a walkable surface, so that if a player switches to Walk mode they won't fall through the surface.

It's a good idea to add a few of these Actors around the same location, so that new people are less likely to overlap the exact location of other players when they join the session.

Click image to expand.

If you've followed all the steps above, you should be able to get multiple users connected to a single design review session, with everyone seeing the custom content you added to the Level.

You can influence the behavior of the Transform and Xray interactions at runtime by the way you set up your content.

The Mobility setting of each Actor determines whether or not you can use the Transform interaction to move that object at runtime. If you want to be able to move the object at runtime, set its Mobility to Movable. If you want to be able to highlight and select the object, but not to be able to move it around in space, set its Mobility to Static.

The hierarchy of parent and child Actors that you see in the Outliner affects both the Transform and Xray interactions.

When you use the Transform interaction to move an object at runtime, all of that object's children move along with the parent automatically, maintaining their current offset from the parent.

For example, in this case all the parts of the transmission are parented to Building_Parent: the large flat foundation Actor.

Click image to expand.

Therefore, at runtime, moving the foundation Actor also moves its child Actors. However, you can still move each child Actor on its own. The next time you move the parent, the children keep their new offsets.

Resetting a child Actor to its original position resets it to its original offset from the parent Actor, not its original position and rotation in world space. Resetting a parent Actor to its original position moves all of its children so that they keep their current offset from the parent.

When you use the Xray Isolate interaction mode, and you select an object in the scene, all other objects that are in the same hierarchy as the selected object are automatically hidden.

For example, in the case of the default scene content, all the objects that make up the main building are under a single top-level parent in the hierarchy. Therefore, when you use Xray Isolate to select any part of the building, all other parts of the building are hidden—that is, all Actors that are parented under the same top-level Building_Parent item.

Click image to expand.

The trees and exterior terrain are unaffected, because they are not under the Building_Parent hierarchy.

The Simulate Physics setting must be off for any Actor that you want to be able to interact with using either the Xray or Transform command. You'll find this in the Details panel under the Physics section.

Click image to expand.

The main menu of the Collab Viewer Template is set up to load the CollaborativeViewer_P Level when users complete the main menu. However, you may want to create a new Level to hold your content, and have the main menu start your own Level instead. If you choose to do this, you'll need to change the logic in the main menu so that it opens your Level when the user joins the session.

To set the starting Level for the Collab Viewer:

Click image to expand.

The next time you start your Project and complete the main menu, you will start inside the custom Level that you set up in the procedure above.

This feature is considered experimental. Currently, it will only function for the single player application, and will be disabled on multiplayer.

You can now load a Datasmith file at runtime. At the moment, it is limited to the .udatasmith file format.

Datasmith runtime loading from the main menu.

Using Your Own 3D Models

Controlling Transform and XRay Behavior

Changing the Starting Level

Loading Datasmith Files at Runtime

Steps

End Result

Steps

End Result

Remarks

The pop-up window to select a file to import in the Collab Viewer.

Actor Relevancy

Unreal Engine levels can be very large. At any time, a player might only see a small fraction of the total number of actors in a level. Most of the actors are not visible or audible, nor do they have a significant effect on the current player. The set of actors the server determines are capable of affecting a client in any significant way are considered relevant for this client. The set of relevant actors is determined on a per-client, or, in networking terms, a per-connection basis. Unreal Engine only replicates actors to a client if they are relevant for that client.

The following image comparison showcase a contrived example that uses distance-based relevancy. The primary actor (in the middle of the frame) is set to have replicated actors remain relevant if they are within 300 centimeters (3 meters). In the before image, the secondary actor is within 300 cm, and is relevant. This means that the secondary actor is replicated to the primary actor’s connection and is visible. In the after image, the secondary actor has traveled beyond 300 cm from the primary actor; therefore, the actor is no longer relevant to the primary actor, is not replicated to the primary actor’s connection, and is not visible.

Dynamically spawned, replicated actors are destroyed on the client when they are no longer relevant. This is why the secondary actor is no longer visible to the primary actor in this case.

The network driver determines whether an actor is relevant for a particular connection with a call to AActor::IsNetRelevantFor. This is handled automatically by the network driver.

You can force any actor to be relevant by calling AActor::ForceNetRelevant in your AActor-derived class.

You can customize actor relevancy by overriding the virtual function AActor::IsNetRelevantFor in your AActor-derived class.