Menu, Slot and Column Settings¶

The settings a menu carries, and the ones its containers carry — a pie slot, a layout column. Button settings are a page of their own: Common Button Settings.

They appear in the editor's Buttons tab, and in the Edit Menu / Edit Container dialogs opened from Preview — Edit Mode.

Help Mode

With Options ▸ UI Settings ▸ Help Mode on, each setting gets a ? button opening the matching section below.

Type¶

What the menu is. It can be changed at any time — the buttons are kept.

Type	What it is
Pie Menu	Radial menu, buttons placed around the cursor. See Pie Menu
Simple Menu	A floating grid panel. See Simple Menu
Layout Panel	A multi-column floating panel. See Layout Menu
Object Menu	Anchored to the selected object, with no shortcut at all — it shows itself when its conditions pass

Name¶

The menu's name. It identifies the menu in the editor list and in the pickers of PIE_CALL / MENU_CALL / LAYOUT_CALL buttons.

A MENU or LAYOUT also draws it as its header label, and a PIE in its center circle.

Description¶

Subtitle drawn under the name — in the center circle of a pie (when Options ▸ Menus Settings ▸ Show Center Pie Menu Description is on), in the header of a panel. Use \n for several lines.

Condition¶

Python expression deciding whether the menu opens at all. When it is False the shortcut falls through to Blender's own binding for that key, so a menu conditioned on Edit Mode leaves the key alone everywhere else.

For a LOCKED or Object menu, the condition instead decides where it is drawn: it stays alive and reappears as soon as it passes again.

Full syntax and the usual expressions: Conditions.

Pie Layout Mode¶

Pie menus only:

Basic — buttons sit around a fixed radius, evenly.
Layout — buttons keep the positions you drag them to.

Position Mode¶

Simple and layout menus:

Basic — opens at the mouse cursor. The pin icon keeps it open; it closes when the mouse leaves and it is not pinned. Free to drag, not saved.
Locked — always opens at the Position X / Y below and stays visible, a permanent panel. No manual repositioning: use the fields.

Position¶

The X / Y a LOCKED menu opens at, plus the direction it grows in.

Expand From¶

Which edge stays fixed when the panel changes size — Center (default), Left / Right edge, and Top / Bottom for the vertical axis. Set it when a growing panel must not push its own buttons around under the cursor.

Width¶

Fixed panel width in pixels. 0 = auto, sized on its content.

Whether the panel draws its header bar, with its label, its Icon and its Dynamic Icon — a Python expression evaluated at draw time, so the header can show what the menu currently acts on.

Hover Expand¶

The menu starts collapsed and expands when the header is hovered, collapsing again when the mouse leaves. Made for a LOCKED panel that should not take room until it is needed.

Close on Click¶

Close the menu when one of its buttons is clicked. A single button can override it — see Close on Click.

Pause on Center Click¶

Pie menus with a center circle: clicking the circle pauses (freezes) the menu. Turn it off to have the click close the menu instead.

Chain Mode¶

Whether this menu takes part in the Maya-style chain (see Chain Mode):

Default — follow the global preference.
On — chains even with the global preference off. Every menu answers for itself, so the menus it calls need On too.
Off — never chains, whatever the preference. Use it when its buttons sit where an ancestor circle would land and eat their clicks.

Remember Pin and Position¶

Remember Pin restores the pinned (and Hover Expand) state the menu had when it closed, the keymap Toggle included. Remember Position reopens it where it was last seen instead of at the cursor.

Auto Show Editor¶

Which editor Auto Show spawns this menu in — the eye icon of the menu list. All Editors spawns everywhere; add a condition on C.area.type to pick which ones.

An object menu has no shortcut: every object menu whose conditions pass is shown at once, next to the selection.

Anchor on Object¶

Which corner or side of the object the menu hangs from — the 3x3 grid mirrors the screen positions.

Object Offset¶

Horizontal and vertical gap, in pixels, between the object and the menu.

Fade¶

Fade After is the seconds of inactivity before the menu fades (0 = never), Opacity the level it fades to. Keeps a permanent menu from covering the model while you work.

Slot Settings¶

A slot is one direction of a pie — it holds one button, or a whole grid of them.

Slot Name¶

Optional name shown in the slot header of the editor, replacing the generated label. Purely to find it again.

Layout¶

Single — one button, placed at the slot's angle.
Grid — several buttons in columns, at that angle.
Row / Column — a single line of buttons.

Columns¶

Number of columns of a GRID slot.

Grid Width and Height¶

Size, in pixels, of the buttons of a GRID / ROW slot. 0 = the value from the menu design.

Grid Anchor¶

Which edge of the grid is pinned to the slot's angle — Top, Center or Bottom. Decides which way the grid grows as buttons are added.

Button Width and Height¶

Size of the single button of a SINGLE slot. 0 = auto for the width (fitted to the label), the design value for the height.

Slot Position¶

Extra X / Y offset in pixels, from where the slot's angle puts it. This is what a pie in Layout mode writes when a slot is dragged.

Slot Condition¶

Python expression hiding the whole slot. When it is False every button of the grid goes with it, on top of each button's own condition — and the slot keeps its place: the other slots do not move.

Hidden¶

Hides the slot without deleting it. Handy while building.

Column Settings¶

A column is a container of a layout menu.

Column Label¶

Header drawn above the column. Leave it empty for an unlabeled column.

Column Width¶

Width in pixels. 0 = auto, fitted to the widest button.

Column Columns¶

How many buttons per row inside the column — 1 is the plain vertical list.

Column Condition¶

Python expression hiding the whole column, buttons included. The remaining columns close the gap, unlike a hidden pie slot.

Column Toggle Condition¶

The ID of a BUTTON_TOGGLE button. The column is drawn only while that toggle is active — how a layout menu gets tabs.

Column Hidden¶

Hides the column without deleting it.