Custom Inspector - break link between duplicate fields?

Questions & Answers
1

I created a custom inspector that lets me duplicate an entry in a list. I have two problems.

(1) Entry 2 points to entry 1 in memory, so if I make a change to entry 1 the change is also made to entry 2.

(2) The entry I’m duplicating is a class with lots of sub-classes. Because of this, if I use new, it needs to be in a way that doesn’t require me to write out a hundred fields.

If I use the default inspector to make a change to a value in a field, the link between the two entries is severed. This is what I’m trying to achieve w/o having to make a change in the default inspector. EditorUtility.SetDirty doesn’t make a difference.

Is there a way to copy entry 1, bring over all of the data in entry 1 to entry 2, and sever the link between them? I suspect I need to use New. If I do need to use new, I’m not sure how to do this without re-adding the data in each field one by one.

Here is a snippet of my code:

CharacterValues.cs: Data for the item (original has more more data)

using UnityEngine;
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;

[Serializable]
public class CharacterValues
{
	public string nameOfItem;
	public int itemGUID;
    public List<Actions> characterActions = new List<Actions>();
}

Character.cs (Use this to store copy of a specific item’s data)

using UnityEngine;

public class Character: ScriptableObject
{
	public CharacterValues CharacterInfo; 
}

CharacterEditor.cs (custom inspector that displays fields for an item)

using UnityEngine;
using UnityEditor;
using System.Collections;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System;
using System.Reflection;

[CanEditMultipleObjects]
[CustomEditor(typeof(Character))]
public class CharacterInspector : Editor 	
{
	private Character character;
	private Database database;
	private List<Actions> characterActions;
	
	// assign currently open template to inspector
	void OnEnable()
	{
		// get the database (store copy & pasted objects)
		GameObject gameObject = GameObject.Find("Databases");
		database = gameObject.GetComponent<Database>();
		
		// get template
		character = (Character)target;	
	}
	
	// UPDATE
	public override void OnInspectorGUI()
	{
		// show existing inspector
		base.OnInspectorGUI();
		
		// A bunch of code is here. action = an Actions entry in a list.
		
		// Copy
		if (GUILayout.Button("Copy"))
			database.copiedActionNode = action;
		
		// Paste
		if (GUILayout.Button("Paste"))
		{
			if (database.copiedActionNode != null)
				characterActions.Insert(actionID+1, database.copiedActionNode); 
		}		
		
		EditorUtility.SetDirty(character);	

	}
2

You need to clone the nested objects so you have a separate copy. I believe you should be able to use Object.Instantiate to do this, but you’ll need to do this for each object reference. I usually create a method that I can call that will return a clone, making sure it creates new instances of nested objects/arrays, and calls the clone method on each of those.

Another way to make a copy which may work since you’re dealing with serializable objects is to serialize the object you want to clone to a memory stream, then deserialize it into a new instance. It should be possible to write a generic function to handle this.