Is it possible to rename objects that are animated

The ability to change the path is nice but if I change a field name that is animated, I have to rebuild the animation on all the objects from scratch since I can't change the field name used.

 

Can we have a tool where we drag & drop an animation clip (or an array or clips) to mass replace existing property name with a new one?

 

I'm at 2021.1 now, and the animation property bindings are still ruined if you rename an animated object. This seems like such a basic feature; rebind an animation property to a new target. This thread is from 2014, and somehow this was never addressed

EDIT:
Users have been implementing this feature on their own. But without hooking into the Animation window itself there are limits to how user friendly you can make it. The result is a workable but S***ty user experience.
https://answers.unity.com/questions/38941/how-to-rebind-animated-variable.html

 

I think we should all agree that this is a broken experience, categorically. If Unity Inc. wants the Unity share price to continue to go up, they have to fix this kind of stuff ASAP.

The 2D Animation package is in "Release Candidate" status; it is time to fix this. Is there a self-respecting product manager that would let this go to "Release" status when this issue exists?

 

Please dont add any unnecessary comments and stay on topic please.

Regarding this thread topic, I've relayed it back to the team folks

 

Yeah, it can be, it's just feels bad to have to do that for such a central UX issue, especially since with the limited access we have to this window every attempt to fix that will result in a poor user experience.

If the only option you leave us is for us to fix the issues in your software, then please give us some way to do it properly.

 

In 2020.3 there is a way to rename the hierarchy path in the Animation Editor, you have to click at the end of the name in the panel a bit longer holding the mousebutton down and release it , then a inputbox appears

 

Just tested and it works in 2021.1.12f1 too.
Now this is good news, but raises questions :
1) Why is it using this horrendous pattern ? Not a standad way to interact with the UI, pretty much impossible to discover until you know it exists.

2) how can we get that after @Jack_Potter answer that looked pretty definitive. Was it added after in the end?

 

So, I found that you cannot change the path of any component on the root. This matches what @Mecanim-Dev said "please note that the root game object name is never included in the path". This means that there is nothing to edit for root properties. That would explain why rename doesn't work on your first screenshot. On your second screenshot where you select Hips though, I don't see why it would fail.

This is unfortunate though, as in my case I need to move the animated sprite from root to a child, and I cannot do this. I'll probably just edit the animation file as serialized text or copy/paste the sprites to the child Sprite property...

Hint: to rename child properties, instead of clicking once, wait, then click again (double-click doesn't work), you can click then F2.

 

The trouble is, even when you rename objects that have been created and animated entirely within Unity (such as particle systems), it breaks your animation. I can't think of any good reason why this should be the case. This is supposed to be a creative tool, but even simple tasks like reorganising and renaming objects become tedious chores. Not everyone who uses Unity is a programmer, you know.

 

For people who only renamed GameObjects tied to an Animation, but did not change the hierarchy, you can simply open the animation file in a notepad and do a "find and replace all" from there.

For example, I have a GameObject called "jonas_prefab" in the animation, but I recently renamed it to "actor2" in the hierarchy window. The animation became invalid, but I quickly fixed it by doing what I mentioned above, letting the text editor change the multiple instances of this line:


I was working with a lot of bones and keys for this project so instead of tediously renaming them one by one in the animation window, this quick text edit finished the work in five seconds.

 

And that luckily works on root properties too!

 

The Best Solution, Thanks Man!

 

I wonder how many comments on a stale thread one needs to realize there's a critically missing feature here.

 

Have run into this issue many times, a huge pain. Clearly a common pain point.