Easy way to set multiple SerializedProperties

Questions & Answers
1

I am making a custom editor for one of my objects. A highly simplified version of that object looks like this:

public class MyClass : MonoBehaviour {
    public int valueA;
    public int valueB;    
    // Whether we want to use value A or B
    public bool useA;
}

When useA is true, valueB is irrelevant and does not need to be shown in the inspector. This is why the custom editor class looks like this:

[CustomEditor(typeof(MyClass)), CanEditMulitpleObjects]
public class MyClassEditor : Editor {
    public override void OnInspectorGUI() {
        SerializedObject tg = new SerializedObject(target);
        bool useA = tg.FindProperty("useA");
        useA.boolValue = EditorGUILayout.Toggle("Use A", useA.boolValue);
        if(useA.boolValue) {
            int valueA = tg.FindProperty("valueA");
            valueA.intValue = EditorGUILayout.Toggle("Value A", valueA.intValue);
        } else {
            // Do the same for valueB
        }
        tg.ApplyModifiedProperties();
    }
}

Now, I am completely new to SerializedObjects, so this might be horribly ineffecient (if so, please tell me!). That is however not the issue. When you have a lot of values to be set in the inspector, the code for the custom editor becomes pretty convoluted and is a lot of work to maintain, as you have to do FindProperty() first, then set it using EditorGUILayout, etc. So my question is: is there an easier way of obtaining values from a SerializedObject? To write this code “cleaner”?

2

Editor codes tend to get quite messy and long, that’s why it’s recommended to have a GUIHelper type of library to manage your often-used stuff, makes life simpler, much less code.

AFAIK, there’s no way around FindProperty - You could use EditorGUILayout.PropertyField instead of manually using Toggles, etc. Using PropertyField, it will automatically detect the type of the property, and it will handle undo/redo for you (your current code doesn’t!) - Also, you don’t need to create a new SerializedObject, there’s already a reference to the SerializedObject of your target which is serializedObject. And finally, that code shouldn’t compile, FindProperty returns a SerializedProperty, and you’re assigning that to an int.

So here’s the cut version of your code:

[CustomEditor(typeof(MyClass)), CanEditMulitpleObjects]
public class MyClassEditor : Editor {

	public override void OnInspectorGUI() {
		serializedObject.Update(); // don't forget this
		SerializedProperty useA = serializedObject.FindProperty("useA");
		EditorGUILayout.PropertyField(useA);
		if(useA.boolValue) {
			SerializedProperty valueA = serializedObject.FindProperty("valueA");
			EditorGUILayout.PropertyField(valueA);
		} else {
			// Do the same for valueB
		}
		serializedObject.ApplyModifiedProperties(); // nor this
	}
}

If you want, you could make an InitSp method to initialize your serialized properties and make your gui code a little nicer, to do this you have to have them as member fields.