Novelty guides and tutorials > Content creation > Using the XML designer
Using the XML designer

Novelty's asset system is based upon XML. XML is a simple markup language and is very easy to learn. In theory you are be able to create objects for Novelty using any text editor of your choice, but the process is much easier with the Novelty XML designer. Besides being a powerful text editor it will automatically parse your XML and generate a live preview of whatever object you are currently working on. Once finished, you can save it either as XML or a Novelty content package (.nvz).


The interface

  1. The view window
  2. Asset library window
  3. XML editor window


Asset library window

This window shows the assets in the correct tree view. The items in the tree all corresponds to a certain piece of XML. Click on an item to preview it in the View window.


XML editor window

This is where you type your markup. The editor is designed to help you to write XML faster and with less errors. The syntax coloring will keep you from making syntactical errors by highlighting invalid syntax.

Whenever the editor recognizes that you've begun to write a new tag it will show an autocompletion popup. It will show a list of possible tags Whenever you need help you can manually call up autocompletion by pressing Ctrl+Space.

Pressing Ctrl+Space while entering a filename is useful for typing the correct filename.


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