Cannot record animation for custom track

Hi,

I am trying to animate a custom PlayableAsset on a custom TrackAsset with Timeline, but the record button does not appear on the track. Just to make sure I did not make a stupid mistake, I followed the guide from this blog exactly https://blogs.unity3d.com/2018/09/05/extending-timeline-a-practical-guide/ .
Weirdly, I can create an animation clip by going "rightclick->Add Key" on the template field of the clip, though. I can view the curves in the timeline editor, but I cannot record. I tried to work around it by adding the animation to an AnimatorController, but that would not work either.
Also, for the build-in AnimationTrack, I can record animations just fine.

Is this a UI bug, or am I missing something? Working with Unity 2019.3.9f1. Thanks!

 

Okay, understood, I guess there are good reasons for that. I think, the feature to create animations is a bit hidden now, though. After adding a key, one can double click to open the animation window for editing, so that's nice.

Maybe I can misuse this here to ask another question. There is quite some boilerplate involved when creating new tracks and playables. Are there plans to add some more abstractions to handle this?

I tried to build some abstraction layers to get rid of redundant code, but it is not easy from down here. For example, I built a class like this

Code (CSharp):

1. public abstract class PlayableAsset<T, TBehaviour> : PlayableAsset
2.     where TBehaviour : PlayableBehaviour<T>, new()
3.     where T : Component
4. {
5.     [SerializeField] private TBehaviour _template;
6.     protected TBehaviour Template => _template;
7.  
8.     public override Playable CreatePlayable(PlayableGraph graph, GameObject owner)
9.     {
10.         return ScriptPlayable<TBehaviour>.Create(graph, _template);
11.     }
12. }

which helps, but unfortunately, animating an inherited template field does not seem to work. Timeline does not offer curves in this case.
PlayableBehaviour<T> handles casting playerData to a specific type T and adding methods like OnPlayableStart() and OnPlayableStop().

Are there any plans in that direction or am I misusing the entire Timeline concept?

 

Okay, thanks. The serialization system is a bit of a downer sometimes Overall Timeline is really great, though, as is your support. Thanks again and happy easter